Switch
by Athena13
Summary: Scrubs. Dishing it out and taking it are two different things.
1. Chapter 1

**Switch**

By Athena13  
Rating: NC17 – adult language, adult themes, sexual situations  
Summary: Dishing it out and taking it are two different things.

* * *

**One**

Her fingers dug into the bare skin of his back as she arched into him, pulling him deeper inside of her. She pulled and pressed, still he did not fill her. She felt his body begin to shake. She groaned mainly in frustration, but to him it sounded like fulfillment. He grunted into her ear and his quick thrusts slowed and lengthened. His groan filled the room as he filled the condom that sheathed him inside her. She panted and collapsed back onto the bed, hoping at least that the weight that pressed down on her would ground her.

"That's was so good." His warm breath was an irritant in her ear. The voice not a sexy, purr that curled her toes.

She made an indistinguishable sound that could be taken for agreement if he so chose to interpret it that way and gently wiggled herself out from under him. She grabbed tissues from the handy box at the bedside and pressed them into his hand.

"I have an early start tomorrow. I need to go."

"You sure?" he grasped her waist and gave her his approximation of a steamy look.

Robin started to lick her lips and then stopped. They tasted…wrong. "I'm sure. Sorry. I didn't realize how late it was." She continued to slither her way out of the bed and fumbled around in the dark for her clothes. She saw him reach for the light. "No. Don't." She bent over, suddenly guilt-stricken, and pressed a kiss to his cheek. "Let me remember you this way." She felt her face heat as the cheesy line tripped off her tongue. It reminded her of someone. The very someone she was here tonight trying to forget. "I mean, it's late. I don't want to…you should get some sleep yourself."

"It was fun. Hot. Let's do this again." He slid his fingers over her shoulder and pressed his lips against hers.

"Definitely," she said, meaning never, and pulled on the rest of her clothes, grabbed her shoes and closed the door behind her.

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

**Two**

"How was it?" Dr. Kelly Lee asked the moment her roommate slunk into their loft apartment. She was sitting in one of their very cushy and trendy navy blue chairs, her bare legs stretched out and resting on a matching ottoman. She had shucked her constricting party clothes and was lounging in pink boxers and a matching cami-tank, her long, silky hair in a pony tail.

Robin groaned and toed off her high-heeled slides. "I just want to take a shower and go to sleep." The girls had gone out that night to a new venue near Mercy Hospital in hopes of finding some fresh meat – and avoiding the old meat. Robin bent on putting Dr. Patrick Drake – old meat – out of her mind had decided to explore the freedom her adventure in the Markham Islands – and in old meat's bed – had awakened in her and had left separately from her roommates and with a very handsome doctor of oncology from Mercy.

"That good or that bad?" Dr. Lainey Winters asked, coming out of the kitchen with a bottle of water in her hand. She was similarly already dressed for bed in white shorts and a tank top.

"Come on, give it to us on a scale of one to ten," Kelly insisted. "We deserve a full debrief since you're the only one of us who got lucky tonight. You did get lucky tonight, right?" She looked at her roommate closely trying to discern whether the woman had chickened out.

"Isn't it kind of cheesy to kiss and tell?" Robin walked into the open plan kitchen and grabbed herself a bottle of water. The whisky she had been drinking that night was starting to catch up with her head. She unscrewed the top, took a drag and then walked back into the living room and slumped down next to Lainey on the checked navy couch.

"Only if you're a guy and it's a relationship," Lainey shot in.

"Is it a relationship?" Kelly asked.

"Decidedly no." Robin grimaced as she remembered the lies she told to get out of there. She was definitely feeling kinship with the more doggy of the human male species. "I'm not very proud here, you know."

"You should be. You're not sitting around moping about Dr. Player, you got right back on that bull and rode it!" Kelly laughed at her own ribald humor.

"He was fine." Robin shrugged. "One night stands aren't really my thing. If I needed more proof."

Lainey sighed and put her arm around Robin. "You're still hung up on…"

"No! No! No! We agreed that he would not be mentioned tonight!" Kelly yelled out.

"Technically it's morning, but she's right." Robin grimaced.

"At least you know that your HIV status doesn't scare away every man like you claimed," Lainey said. "You just need to keep at it."

"Yeah, yeah. Force a smile until it comes naturally. I'm going to go to bed." Robin leaned over and pressed a kiss to Lainey's cheek before standing up. "Thanks guys." She patted Kelly on the head as she passed by her.

"We still want details!" Kelly called out as Robin closed the door.

Robin leaned up against the closed door and switched on the light in her new bedroom trying to chase the ghosts away. Though he'd never been there and she could still smell the paint she had painstakingly applied just the day before on the walls, somehow she felt surrounded by him in there. Or rather, she admitted as she walked over to the dresser to grab her night things, not surrounded by him. She ached with it.

Truth was, she missed Patrick Drake and rather than getting easier it was getting harder as time went on. How, she wondered, had she gotten so damned attached so quickly?

TBC


	3. Chapter 3

**Three**

"Dr. Scorpio, do you have notes on the Krakauer case?"

"No." Robin didn't look up or miss a beat when responding to Dr. Patrick Drake's question.

"There are patient's lives on the line while you pout, Dr. Scorpio," Patrick snapped. The tone of his voice caught the attention of everyone else standing at or near the nurse's station. Not because the tone was new, indeed, Dr. Drake had been snappish and short with just about everyone over the past week. What attracted attention was finally seeing him taking it out on what everyone knew was the cause of his distemper – Dr. Robin Scorpio.

Robin barely restrained herself from slamming her pen down before turning her head to look at him. "You never gave me the file, Dr. Drake." Her cheeks burned in embarrassment at the implication of his accusation – that she was unprofessional - and the unwanted attention he attracted with it.

Patrick opened his mouth to argue, but no words came out when he looked into Robin's eyes. He frowned and looked over to Nurse Epiphany for confirmation.

"You said you left it in your office and would bring it back after you finished your surgery," the nurse confirmed smoothly. "You were standing right where you are now, hovering over Dr. Scorpio like you are now."

Robin closed the file she was working on and reached around Patrick and handed it to Epiphany. Then she turned back around and opened the next one in the pile that Epiphany had ordered her to finish before disappearing back into the lab. At least, she thought to herself, all this avoidance of Patrick was doing wonders for her lab work. She pointedly kept her eyes averted from Patrick. Her cheeks were still red and she could still feel all eyes on them.

"I'll go get it, now." Patrick cast one of his now habitual longing looks at Robin's back and then walked off. The moment he was clear of the nurse's station Robin turned and gave his back her now habitual longing look.

Epiphany closed her eyes and muttered under her breath something about stupid children.

Robin heard her, scowled and scratched out the gibberish she had written while pretending to ignore Patrick's scowling looks. She signed off on the last file with an exaggerated groan and stretched her neck back and forth. "Epiphany, could you just leave Dr. Drake's file in my box. I'll look at it later."

Before Epiphany could respond Dr. Kelly Lee rushed over and leaned across the counter. "You have to come with me, Robin!"

Robin turned around to look at her new roommate. "Come where? What's happened?"

"What's happened is that we have a ton of things to pick up for our housewarming party and Lainey has a client in crisis."

"Housewarming party, we haven't even finished unpacking." Robin blinked at her.

"The unpacking isn't going anywhere and it's the perfect time to throw a party."

Robin blinked again. Sometimes she really didn't get her new roommate's logic. "When are we throwing this party and why is it such an emergency." A small smile curved her lips now, though. If nothing else, Kelly was fun and a great distraction.

"Well, not until Friday…"

"Kelly, we have five days to get ready," Robin pointed out reasonably.

"And if you don't get out of that lab you're going to turn into a bat."

"That's so…so…scientific of you, Dr. Lee." Robin laughed despite herself.

"Epiphany, sign Dr. Scorpio out. She has shopping to do."

"Wait, wait, you can't just…" Robin sighed as she saw Epiphany sign her out.

"You're signed out, Dr. Scorpio," Epiphany added. "Go get some color back in those cheeks."

"I still have lab work." Robin knew it was a half-hearted protest, so when Kelly chimed in with "lab assistants" she gave up. "So, where is it I'm going and just who is invited to this party?"


	4. Chapter 4

**Four**

"Where'd Ro…Dr. Scorpio go?" Patrick asked Epiphany. He was trying, and failing, to sound nonchalant.

"Dr. Scorpio's more rambunctious roommate dragged her out of here. Party planning." Epiphany sniffed. In Epiphany's opinion Dr. Kelly Lee needed to chill out and focus more on work and less on men. She didn't juggle the two interests as well as the Doctors Drake. But she made Dr. Scorpio smile so Epiphany gave her some leeway.

"Dr. Scorpio is having a party?" Patrick put the Krakauer file down and leaned his hip on the counter. For the first time in days his face broke out into a big smile.

"And you think you're going to be invited after how you treated that girl?" Epiphany scoffed.

"What party would be complete without me?" Patrick bit his lip and batted his long eyelashes.

"Leave the woman alone if you have no intention of following through." Epiphany pointed at him threateningly. "I saw you go running last time. Hurt her again and this time I trip you on your way out."

Patrick smiled winningly and walked over and pressed a kiss to Epiphany's cheek. Then he strode off, whistling.

"I guess it's going to be a big, fat, beautiful day again soon." Epiphany pursed her lips, shook her head and got back to work.

* * *

"Well, well, well. Look what the cat dragged in," Kelly drawled as she hung onto the edge of the door and looked Patrick up and down looking for weak spots.

"Retract the claws and let the man in," Lainey called out from the kitchen where she and Robin were unpacking the supplies for the party that Robin and Kelly had picked up.

"Fine." Kelly sighed and opened the door. She eyed Patrick warily as he strode past her.

Robin wiped her hand on a kitchen towel and walked out to meet them. "Is that the Krakauer file? Sorry, I missed you at the hospital. I got, uh, waylaid." Robin held her hand out for the file. Her heart was pounding as he walked closer and stood near her in her new home.

"I understand. I take my party planning very seriously." Patrick handed over the file and walked, uninvited, around Robin into the kitchen to look at what the ladies had purchased. He made a lot of approving and disapproving noises as he inspected the stash, his eyes darting over to Robin every few seconds.

Robin was sitting on a stool at the kitchen counter trying to focus on the file and ignore his show, but her eyes kept getting drawn back to him chatting with her roommates and juggling with their paper cups and other party supplies.

"So, when's this party and what should I wear?" Patrick asked.

Robin's head snapped up and she frowned at him, then at her roommates who clearly were not about to dissuade him.

"Friday night. Anytime after eight," Kelly said, ignoring Robin's squeaking protest. "But you can come earlier if you help us pick up the refreshments. We need a big strong man to carry stuff."

Robin rolled her eyes at Kelly's blatant use of flirting to get a strong back to help. "The three of us have it under control," Robin said coolly.

"It's no problem to help out three lovely ladies. What do you need? Ice, beer, mixers, soda? A sexy bartender?"

"We put in an order at Discount Beverages. All you need to do it pick it up. It includes ice," Lainey said. "We'd really appreciate the help."

"My pleasure. Why don't you give me a call when you're done reviewing that file, Dr. Scorpio." He sauntered around the counter and leaned into Robin's personal space. "I'm available to answer any questions you might have. You have my number." He leaned in closer, as if he was going to kiss her, but instead of pressing her lips to hers he turned his head at the last moment and whispered in her ear. "I made sure this included the most recent lab results." He winked and headed towards the door. "Hot pad, ladies. See you Friday." He closed the door behind him.

Robin turned and nailed her roommates with a glare. Her breathing was shallow and her heart was threatening to pound its way out of her chest. "How could you invite him?" She demanded. She had been sure he was going to kiss her. Worse, rather than kicking him like she should have, she wanted him to. And now he was not only coming to, but helping with their party. She was going to crumble, she knew it and then she'd right back where she started two weeks ago. Falling in love and then left in the dust.

"How could we not? He knew about it. He offered to help." Lainey looked sympathetic, but she also shrugged.

"We promised that this wouldn't be one of those Port Charles parties where people we don't even like or really know are invited!" Robin threw her hands in the air.

"We've invited practically everyone from two hospitals, it would be weird if he was the only person not invited," Kelly defended, her vamp act vanishing along with Patrick.

"That kind of weird I could have dealt with. I'm going to go review this file." Robin stood up and went into her room.

Kelly and Lainey stood quietly until they heard her door close. "So, Dr., why do you think he showed up and invited himself to the party?" Kelly asked quietly.

"Because he's still hung up on Robin and wants her back," Lainey said. "I just don't know if he's playing for keeps or just sex. Obviously he has feelings, I just don't know if he's ready to do anything about them yet."

"If he hurts her again no one will be able to find the body."

"I'll help."

* * *

"Mission accomplished." Patrick was satisfied, but, he admitted as he walked back to the hospital, he also felt uneasy.

It wasn't the threatening looks of Robin's roommates, the words her father had with him, his father's disappointed looks or Epiphany's threats that made him uneasy, it was his own reaction to Robin's nearness. The thing was he wasn't supposed to have a reaction. He was supposed to get a rise out of her and somehow get her to respond to him so that they could get their strictly platonic relationship back on track. But friendly was not how he felt when his lips almost brushed hers a few moments ago. He hadn't even intended to get that close; it had been an automatic gesture in response to her scent and the heat of her nearness.

He slid his hands into the pockets of his slacks and took a turn towards the docks. He stood looking out over the dark waters of the river as his mind took an uncharacteristically inward looking turn. He had missed her, he admitted now. Not just in his bed, that he couldn't have fooled even himself about after nights of tossing and turning, but in his life. He closed his eyes and blew out a breath before he could start listing the things about her he missed.

Behind his lids flashed the image of Robin's dark eyes. He could see the shocked hurt in them from when he had called things off. He could see the tears that made her eyes shimmer. And he could see the sadness and conflict in them that he saw tonight. All of those images cut him to the quick. He had assumed that stepping back would make it all go away, that he wouldn't hurt her. That he wouldn't want her so much. It wasn't working out that way.

Wanted or not there was an emotional bond. There were, as Dr. Robin Scorpio diagnosed, feelings. Whether or not he did it, whether or not it was what he was about, he needed to have her back. And in order to do that he'd have to reconsider his no-strings policy. And convince Robin to give him another shot.

He didn't know which would be harder to accomplish.

TBC


	5. Chapter 5

**Five**

"Hello, Dr. Scorpio." Patrick leaned down and put his elbow on the nurse's station counter across from Robin.

"Dr. Drake." Robin looked up from her paperwork and smiled tentatively at Patrick. "Surgery go well?"

"Of course. Lab work go well?"

Robin snorted and then cleared her throat. "Lab work go well? Laying it on a bit thick aren't you? What do you want?" He'd been like this, friendly and interested, ever since he had invited himself to their housewarming party – or as Kelly called it the busting the hymen of the party pad. It was giving her the creeps.

"I'm just being polite to a colleague." He bit his lip and smiled impishly.

"You and polite is a scary combination. Downright suspicious actually." Robin narrowed her eyes. "What is it you want? Are you regretting your offer to pick up the beverages for the party and trying to back out gracefully?"

"Not at all." Patrick paused. "Although, it is a really big list. A lesser man might try to back out. Fortunately, I'm not a lesser man."

It was on the tip of Robin's tongue to say something sharp in reference to Patrick doing and being just that, but stopped herself in time. The sharp edge of her anger came and went, but still was completely unjustified since the agreement had been no commitment, regardless of what that had come to feel about the other. "We appreciate the help," she mumbled and looked down at her paperwork, knowing her eyes betrayed more than they should.

"How much do you…"

"Patrick, can I speak to you for a moment?" Noah's voice cut him off.

"Can this wait?" Patrick scowled at his father. "Robin and I were just…"

"I have rounds. I'll see you both later." Robin gathered her files up, smiled at Noah and let her eyes settle on Patrick only for a second for politeness' sake before walking away.

"Thanks a lot, Dad." Patrick stood up and faced his father. "What was so urgent it couldn't wait until we were done?"

"What exactly is it that you're doing with Robin?"

Patrick's eyes hardened. "What business is it of yours?" He put his hands on his hips, flaring his white lab coat.

"Are you ready to admit you have feelings for her?"

"Again, what business is it of yours?" Patrick snapped.

"I've watched you moping around this hospital for two weeks after you broke it off with her. Now, suddenly you're turning on the charm again and I'm telling you if you're just planning to get her back into back into bed and then hurting her again I'm not going to let you do it." Noah pointed his finger at his son threateningly. "She's a wonderful woman, Patrick. She deserves better than that."

"Don't tell me what Robin does or does not deserve. I don't owe you any explanations," Patrick bit out. He glared at his father for a moment, hurt blaring out of his eyes, then he dropped his hands and turned away.

"Patrick?" Noah grabbed onto his son's arm before he could walk away. "I care about both of you. I just want you both to give each other the chance to have something real between you."

Patrick blew out a breath, but before he could speak Noah had sped away. He rubbed a hand over his face and went back to work.

* * *

Robin pushed open the door to the locker room and saw a familiar back sitting on the bench. Patrick didn't turn his head when she came in. She hesitated for a moment before continuing on to her locker. She opened it up, found the meds she was going to need for the rest of her time in the lab and closed the door again and paused, thinking. Then, with a sigh she walked around the other side of the lockers and approached Patrick from the front.

She got a look at his face and as she suspected he looked troubled. That he didn't bother to hide it proved that he knew that she was the one who had entered the locker room. She knew she was the only one he ever let see him like this. That this hadn't changed made her heart speed up. She knew she was in dangerous territory.

"Hi," she said, walking another step closer. "You all right?"

He tilted his head and smiled at her ruefully.

"Dumb question." She swiped her palm on her beige pants nervously. "What happened? Is it a patient or Noah?"

"You're good." He looked heavenward and then back at Robin. "It's my father. We got into it earlier. Now, he's in surgery and we can't clear the air, even if I knew what to say. I never seem to know what to say to him."

"Oh." Robin cleared her throat. It was awkward, but she couldn't bring herself to walk away. "What did you argue about?"

"You." Patrick gave her a soft smile.

"Me?" Robin blinked in surprise.

"My father has a soft spot for you." Patrick shrugged. "Can't blame him."

"I don't get it." Robin's face showed her confusion.

"He…"

Just then there was a page for Doctor Patrick Drake to OR 3.

"I have surgery." Patrick stood up.

"You should go."

"If you're around, I'll come by to finish this conversation. Maybe we can go somewhere where I can finish a sentence."

Robin blinked again in surprise. "Okay." She put her hands on her hips and frowned as he watched Patrick leave. He was voluntarily coming to her to talk about what happened with his father?

"Who was that man and where is Patrick Drake?" She shook her head and headed back to the lab.

TBC


	6. Chapter 6

**Six**

Patrick walked further into the lab. He had knocked softly at the door, but there had been no answer so he let himself in. Once inside he saw why she wasn't answering. A small smile made his dimple peep out as he watched her. She was manipulating a microscope with one hand and typing data into a computer with the other. Her concentration was total. As little as a year ago the sight would have made him snort dismissively at someone purporting to have an M.D. who hid out in a lab. Not because he didn't think research was necessary to medicine, but because he thought the people who did it only chose it because they were too cowardly to face patients and particularly the challenge of surgery. Robin had proven an exception to the rule. She was just as good with patients as she was with brain cells. And, he rubbed his side absently, she wielded a scalpel just as ably.

She also proved that researchers could be sexy. He grinned and walked forward past the rows of lab tables until he reached hers. As he moved closer she dropped her hand from the laptop and began to rub the back of her neck. He walked up behind her and slid his fingers over the skin of her neck. "It's me," he said when she startled and then began massaging the stiff muscles.

"Oh god, that feels good." Robin moaned and closed her eyes.

Her words went straight to his groin. He cleared his throat, massaged a bit longer and then stepped to the side so he could look into her face. "Better?"

"If you ever decide to give up surgery you could open a massage parlor," Robin tilted her head and smiled at him.

"My happy endings would be the stuff of legends." He grinned.

Robin closed her eyes and shook her head. A pretty blush stained her cheeks. Then she opened her eyes and looked at Patrick who was still grinning winningly at her. "Are you really here to talk?" she asked.

"Would you rather have that happy ending?"

Robin burst into laughter. "Do you ever stop?" Actually, she was glad he didn't. It was the polite, well-behaved Patrick of that past few days that was freaking her out. This Patrick was the one she was used to. He was also the one she couldn't resist.

"It's late, have you had dinner?" he asked instead of answering her rhetorical question.

"No. You?" Her answer was hesitant.

"I just got out of surgery. Are you game?"

Robin thought for a moment. "Actually, I'm kind of tired. I was planning to finish up here and go home."

"You have to eat. How about we go back to my room and get room service. You can relax and I can regale you with the story of how I mistreated my poor father and listen avidly to your lecture."

She said nothing, just looked at him curiously.

"I'll be a perfect gentleman." He spread his hands and showed her his palms. "Come on. Finish up and I'll meet you downstairs in fifteen?" He deliberately pushed it so she wouldn't have time to think or ask questions.

"All right." Robin watched him walk out for a moment before turning back to her work.

* * *

"I'm really sorry about kicking the track last time," Robin said.

She and Patrick were sitting on the floor playing with his race car set again. Around them was litter from the dinner they had ordered and eaten. Salads, corn dogs and water – a compromise of the junk food he preferred and the healthy food she preferred. Over dinner they had talked about Patrick's ongoing conflict with Noah and Patrick's frustration that he couldn't say anything right to his father and visa versa, though he didn't divulge exactly what Noah had said to Patrick except to say Noah was being protective of her. She hesitantly offered advice and he didn't bite her head off. The entire evening was surreal.

Patrick grunted, keeping his eyes on his car, his entire body was fairly trembling with the excitement of competition. "Yes!" He dropped the controller and threw his arms into the air. "I win!"

"Congratulations." Robin rolled her eyes and put her controller down. It was getting late and true to his word Patrick had been the perfect host – meaning that he hadn't made a single move on her. She was totally confused and thinking about going home.

"Since I win I get to choose my prize." He turned and looked at her.

And Patrick Drake was back again. "I didn't agree to that." She narrowed her eyes at him.

"It's house rules." He shrugged.

"This isn't a house, it's a hotel room." She sighed when he just looked at her stubbornly. "Fine, what do you think I'm going to reward you with? Does it involve one of us removing our clothes?"

"In a way. You're going to watch a movie with me now."

"I'm going to watch a movie with you?" she parroted stupidly.

"Yup. My choice."

"What's your choice?" She smirked at him, expecting the title of a porn.

"Speed."

Robin shook her head as if to clear her ears. "Speed as in Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock and a bus?" Her voice was high with shock.

Patrick grinned. He was thoroughly enjoying keeping Robin Scorpio unbalanced. "I did. Come on." He stood up and held a hand out to her. She hesitated a moment and then put her hand in his. He pulled her up. "You still have some things here, do you want to change?" He pushed the hair that had fallen on her face behind her ears.

"Patrick," Robin began.

"Shhh." Patrick put a finger on her lips. "You're tired. Let's watch the movie. We can talk later."

* * *

Patrick took his eyes off the television and looked down at Robin. They were lying in his bed, on top of the covers, watching the television that was in the armoire across from the bed. Before the movie had begun, Robin had changed into shorts and a t-shirt and put her hair into a pony tail. It wasn't easy, but he'd kept his hands and lips off her when she emerged from his bathroom and warily got on the bed and settled in front of him. The movie was almost over, but she had fallen asleep not thirty minutes in to it. She was on the pillow closest to the television, in front of him, and in her sleep she had moved back seeking out his heat. Her nearness was driving him wild, he could he knew, seduce her, but he was trying to show her and himself that he could be the man she needed and could rely on. He was trying to show her that he had feelings for her without actually having to say it, not just because the words were hard, but because he was afraid she wouldn't believe them unless he backed them up with action.

He trailed his fingers lightly over her hip and leaned down and pressed a kiss to her cheek. He froze when she shifted, but when she didn't awaken he reached in front of her and grabbed the remote and turned the movie off. Then he reached down to the end of the bed and covered her with an extra blanket.

TBC


	7. Chapter 7

_**Not for children.**_

**Seven**

"Mmmmmmm," Robin sighed and shifted against the firm body surrounding her. The heat brought her more fully awake. She opened her eyes and saw the dark, familiar room and realized the heat was Patrick. She lifted her head and saw that she was still lying on top of the covers with an extra blanket covering her. She turned her head and saw that Patrick was under the covers. She turned back to check the time. 2 am. She should get up and go home, she told herself. Even as the words drifted through her mind she was rolling over to look at Patrick. The sight of him sleeping, as always, took her breath away.

He was so beautiful. There was no denying that he was a good-looking man, but the innocence of sleep made him glow with it. He rarely looked this peaceful and happy when he was awake. Though he did sometimes. Like that day in the cabin when she caught him staring at her and he told her she was beautiful. That's how he looked now and like then she could not resist him. She reached over and traced her fingers over the flush of his cheeks.

He was being different this week. Being an intelligent, analytical woman she knew he was trying to prove something to her. She just wasn't sure what. Was it that he wanted them to be friends again or was he working his way to something more? Something with strings? Either way she wanted him back in her life too. Maybe having only a piece of him was better than not having him at all? The thought hurt her heart.

As she touched him his eyelashes fluttered and his eyes opened. His lips curved into a smile as he focused on her. Her breath caught, but she didn't remove her fingers.

"Molesting me in my sleep, Robin?"

The husk of his voice set a fire burning in the pit of her belly. "Maybe." She leaned down and pressed her lips against his, opening hers and his at the same time.

He lifted his arm and slid his fingers into her hair.

The kiss was a wet, sensuous slide. As it went on and on she reached down and cupped his arousal through the blanket. He gasped into her mouth and tightened his grip on her head as she pressed the heel of her hand tighter and began to rub. He groaned and spread his legs. In one fluid movement she moved the blanket aside and straddled him. He tangled both hands into her hair and let her keep the lead.

She sat up and pulled her shirt off and he reached up and cupped her small, pert breasts. She gave a moan of approval and moved herself over him and then leaned down to kiss him again. With her right hand she reached into the bedside table and pulled out a condom. They had taken to keeping supplies on both sides of the bed so there was no interruption. As she came back from her reach Patrick flipped them over and began to trail kisses all over her bare torso. Her breasts. Her stomach. Her side. Her hips. He pressed his knuckle between her legs and stroked her through her clothing. As her movements became frantic he looked up into her face for consent before sliding her shorts and panties down her hips and off her body. He took the condom from her hand and pushed his own underwear down and sheathed himself with the protection.

Her eyes were closed and her head thrown back as he settled between her legs.

"Robin."

Her eyes opened and he looked into them as he surged into her.

He called her name over and over again as they moved together, tighter and higher with each stroke. Her legs trembled and he felt her tightening around. "Only Robin."

She didn't know what the words meant but she broke apart around him at the sound of them. Crying out, arching and locking her legs around his thighs. The sound of his release was the sound of her name.

He collapsed to the side and pulled her with him as they fell back to earth. She kept her eyes closed as long as she could. When she finally opened them he was looking at her. She couldn't read his expression.

TBC


	8. Chapter 8

**Eight**

She wanted to ask what he was thinking, but she could barely catch her breath to speak. This felt like the moment in the cabin when he had lay like a deer caught in headlights and she had thought it was because he was freaking out about having had sex with an HIV positive woman. Then it became clear that it was because he was afraid she was going to demand a commitment and he would have to let her down. Except, maybe it wasn't that clear. She had come to think as time passed that it wasn't so much her feelings that had overwhelmed him but his own. It didn't matter though, because he hadn't been willing to admit them or do anything with them except run. Whether that had changed she didn't know and couldn't tell. All she knew is that now, having made love to him again, she knew without a doubt she couldn't settle for what they'd had before, it would hurt more than walking away again. She closed her eyes against the pain.

"Robin?" Patrick's hand was on her face. "Are you all right?"

Robin took a deep breath and blew it out as she opened her eyes. "What just happened, I know it was my fault, but I just can't do this." Robin sat up and started to turn away.

"Expecting me to live down your expectations again?" he snapped. She turned back to look into his thunderous countenance and her heart sank. She was doing it again, everything she accused him of. He ran, she pushed. She settled back against the pillows and rubbed her face. "Sorry," she mumbled. She looked at him again, willing herself to be vulnerable.

"This is never going to work if you keep assuming the worst about me. Maybe I deserve it sometimes, but not all the time." He sat up and took her hand, settling their entwined fingers in his lap.

"This?"

At Robin's half-hopeful question Patrick smirked. He leaned in and whispered conspiratorially, "This relationship."

"Is that what this is? A relationship?" Robin asked huskily, her heart in her throat, her eyes lighting up with hope.

"Hasn't it always been, regardless of what I said?" Patrick paused for a moment, searching for the right words. "I have feelings for you and this is and has been more than just sex for a long time now."

"Is that you're way of saying I was right?" Robin smothered her smirk at Patrick's glare. "I have feelings for you, too." She toyed with their joined fingers with her free hand.

"How could you help it?" Patrick shrugged. "But you have to be able to trust me. I'm trying to show you that you can. As perfect as I may be, I'm probably going to make mistakes and I'm not going to just fall in line with what how you think I should be, but when I put my mind to something I always succeed."

"And you want to succeed at this relationship?"

"Do you need it in writing?"

"I just want to make sure that I'm not misunderstanding. A lot of the time your words and actions don't match, Patrick."

"That's what I'm working on here." Patrick sighed and scratched at his forehead. "I was showing you the actions, now you have the words. I think it's your turn now. Are you willing to give this a try or are your expectations of me too low?"

Robin swallowed as she realized just how far on a limb Patrick had just gone. "What I said, when I say that I don't really mean it. I'm just trying to protect myself and my pride. I think you're an amazing man, you just hide it sometimes." She bit her lip and let out a shaky breath. "I want to do this with you."

Patrick gave her a lascivious smirk, taking her words into the realm of sexual innuendo. Robin rolled her eyes, but she was smiling.


	9. Chapter 9

**Nine**

"You could have made more than one trip," Robin said dryly as she opened the loft door to reveal Patrick who was loaded down with two boxes almost blocking his view and many, many bags.

"Not helping!" he grunted and shifted the packages precariously.

"Oh!" Robin looked trying to find a way to take something from him that wouldn't cause it all to topple and take him with it.

"Move!" Patrick cried out, half in laughter and half in panic.

Robin jumped back. "Clear the way!" she warned her roommates who were laying out the food on the kitchen counters. She slid the loft door closed and rushed after Patrick and caught one of the bags that fell after he put the boxes down on the breakfast bar in the space that Lainey and Kelly had hurriedly cleared for him.

"You could have called and we would have come down and helped," Robin scolded as she took his hands and inspected them. "You didn't hurt your hands did you?"

Patrick rolled his eyes and took his hands back. "I'm a big boy, Mama Scorpio. I know how not to hurt my hands."

"I bet you know what to do with your hands," Kelly chimed in.

"That's not what he said." Robin snorted and rolled her eyes. Kelly was irrepressible.

"Let's get the ice into the chests on the deck and load in the beer and soda. We also have a garbage can for the…"

"Has she been ordering you around all afternoon?" Patrick interrupted and looked at Robin's roommates sympathetically.

"I'm just trying to get things done." Robin put her hands on her hips and glared at Patrick.

"Your way. I think we all know how to…" he trailed off and cleared his throat.

"What? Why are you stopping your lecture, Dr. Drake?" Robin smirked at him.

"Well, now that we're, uh, you know, dating, I thought maybe I shouldn't…do that." Patrick flushed and shifted around uncomfortably.

"You mean now that you're Robin's boyfriend you should act like you're whipped?" Lainey asked in an innocent tone of voice. Robin's lips twitched. Kelly didn't bother holding back her laughter.

"Hey! That's not what I said!" Patrick flushed more.

"Patrick." Robin walked up to him and put her hand on his chest. "We're dating, not getting lobotomies or personality transplants. If you feel threatened by my ability to organize things and accomplish goals you should feel free to express it." She bit her lip to keep from laughing.

"Hey!" Patrick cried out again and then started to laugh. Robin grinned up at him and winked. He bent down and pressed a kiss to her forehead. "Where should I put the ice?"

"Boyfriend, huh?" Kelly walked over, holding a bag of ice. Patrick let go of Robin and held out his arms and looked at her, waiting for the punch-line. "Just remember to lock the linen closet doors from now on."

Robin covered her face in mortification. Patrick just laughed and thanked her for the tip. Moments later they all headed outside carrying bags of ice and they worked in harmony setting up the beverages.

"You know as first official loft boyfriend you have certain duties," Lainey said. Patrick, Robin and Kelly looked at her questioningly. "Changing lightbulbs in high places. Killing bugs. Opening jars."

"You mean man's work. Does this mean that you'll do my laundry and dishes?"

"Hey!" All three women admonished.

He shrugged and popped open a beer and sat back against the deck railing.

"Who said you could have a drink yet?" Robin teased as she stood over him with her hands on her hips.

"The sweat rolling down my back from carrying it in."

"Does this mean you need a shower?" Robin asked.

"I told you we had to give her the bedroom with the ensuite bathroom," Kelly said. Lainey grimaced and nodded.

"What I meant is that we need to get ready for the party," Robin said, her voice squeaky with embarrassment.

"They know what you meant, honey," Patrick interjected.

"God. I'm going go get ready. You do what you want!" She threw her hands up and turned and stormed back inside.

"She's cute when she's embarrassed," Patrick observed with a smitten grin.

* * *

"You're not really mad," Patrick said as he walked into the bathroom. Robin had started the water for a shower and was starting to get undressed.

"No? Is that observation based on your keen knowledge of women?" Robin snarked.

"No, my keen knowledge of you. You're embarrassed but you really like it when I get dirty with you."

Robin closed her eyes and started counting under her breath. Then she stopped and cursed the damned counting. "With me, not in front of the entire world!"

"Your friends are not the entire world. I'm sure it's not surprising to hear that we might be showering together."

"Thinking about it and hearing about it are two different things." Robin tossed her shirt into the hamper.

"Aw, come on, Scorpio. Don't pretend you don't tell your friends details. Do the words stallion and broken hip mean anything?" He leaned in close and brushed his lips against her ear.

Robin closed her eyes. "How long were you standing there anyway?"

"Never telling." Patrick licked his bottom lip and reached around and undid the clasp of Robin's bra. "You're the one who said we weren't getting personality transplants."

"I didn't mean you should act like you were fifteen," Robin muttered and then sighed as he pulled down her shorts.

"It'll keep you young," Patrick insisted as he began to take off his own clothes.

Robin opened her eyes and watched as he tossed his clothes onto the floor of the bathroom. Once he'd kicked them aside and they landed in a wet spot she tilted her head and looked at him in mock curiosity. "Did you bring anything to change into?" she asked.

Patrick's jaw dropped as he remembered the one bag he had left in the car.

* * *

"You're just mean."

"What happened to showing my roommates what they're missing now that you're a taken man?" Robin asked as she looked in the mirror to put in her dangly silver earrings. "Since when are you so shy, anyway." She smoothed her hair down and looked at Patrick who was buttoning his gray-blue shirt.

"Since your next door neighbor is a big, burly man who told me that I had a nice towel."

Robin giggled and walked up to Patrick, undeterred by his glare and reached up to finish his buttoning job. "You look mighty handsome, Dr. Drake."

"Don't try to appeal to my vanity now to make up for making me go to the car in my towel to get my bag."

"But you are so handsome, Dr. Drake." She looped her arms around his neck and pressed her body into his. At his request she was wearing the same red dress she had worn on their first date after her return from the Maarkham Islands.

He smoothed his hands over the material at her hips and sighed. "I don't know if this boyfriend-girlfriend thing is going to work for me if it means habitual humiliation for me," he teased.

"You get your shots in. And I would have gone to get your clothes myself, fully dressed, if you hadn't squirted me with the moisturizer while I was offering."

"That was an accident!" Patrick insisted as he tried and failed to stop from snickering.

"You opened the bottle, aimed it at me and squeezed." She pressed a kiss to chin. "Being in a relationship is not about being mean to each other. I hope that you don't think that."

Patrick wrapped his arms around her and leaned down. "Don't worry, I don't. We're fun you and I. I like it that we can laugh together. I missed that. I missed you." He stroked her cheek.

"Me too," Robin admitted. "I'm really happy that we're giving this a try. And I'm really happy when the b-word is mentioned you've stopped flinching."

"I never flinched." Patrick laughed and kissed her cheek. "But I might really suck at this, you know."

"So you keep telling me. There's no magic formula. Just communication, respect…"

"Good sex."

"Yes, good sex, fun, laughter." She paused. "And the occasional humiliating moment."

"And more mind-bending sex," Patrick whispered huskily before capturing his lips for a heated kiss. When he pulled back he brushed the hair that had fallen on her cheek back. "There's something I want you to know. While we were together, and after, I didn't…I was never with anyone else. I tried, I almost, but I never did."

Robin's entire being froze at his confession. She opened her mouth to speak.

"You don't have to say anything," Patrick said, putting his hand over her lips. "I just wanted you to know."

"Patrick, I really should…"

"No. Don't. It's the past now. From here on out it's just you and I. Like we agreed." He leaned in and kissed her. "Come on. I hear your roommates reorganizing your work and I want to watch you trying to put it back in order." He grinned and pulled her out of the room. She followed along, but her expression was still troubled.

TBC


	10. Chapter 10

**Ten **

"I can see where Robin got her beauty." Noah Drake bowed over Anna's hand and pressed a soft kiss to the back of it. When he stood up he still held onto her hand and gave her a sparkling smile before slowly releasing it.

"Hands off the wife, Drake," Robert snapped at his old friend.

"Ex-wife." Anna tossed her hair and smiled back at Noah, enjoying both Noah's blatant charm and Robert's annoyance. Feeling spunky, she stepped closer to Noah. "Our son and daughter seem to have made peace with each other," she said in a husky tone, glancing at Robert's glare and smiling smugly.

All three parents turned to look at Robin and Patrick chatting animatedly with a group of friends. To everyone's surprise, Patrick was standing behind Robin, his hand on her bare shoulder as she leaned back against him. Both were holding beers and obviously having a great time. It was as big a statement as their relationship as Patrick could possibly make without words.

"I'd say it's more than peace," Noah commented.

"Looks like the piker finally got out of his own way and wised up,' Robert commented.

"I say we propose a toast to the ungettable get." Tracy Quatermaine, Robert's "date" for the evening walked over and handed Robert a cup of champagne from the bottle she had brought for their private consumption.

" Tracy, I must say I'm surprised to see you here," Anna commented.

"Robin is a darling girl. I watched her grow up without her parents into a lovely young woman." Tracy gave Robert a pointed look, reminding him of the berating she had given him on that score when he first returned to town. "It's nice to see her happy and not with my nephew the thug."

"Cheers to that." Robert dinked his paper with Tracy's at the sentiment.

Anna turned to face Noah who was watching and listening in amusement to the exchange. "How about you and I go find some ginger ale?" Anna slipped her arm into Noah's. Noah winked at her and led her away from her ex-husband and his…whatever.

* * *

"This is just so fun. I told you this would be a total party pad!" Kelly yelled over the whir of the blenders. A couple of people had brought blenders as self-interested housewarming gifts and Kelly had declared herself the master of the blender drinks and set them up in the kitchen counter.

"I can't believe all the people who showed up," Lainey yelled back from her perch on a stool across the counter from Kelly. "It's because of Robin."

"We definitely have a popular roommate."

Robin took Patrick's empty beer and slipped away. He was engaged in a deep conversation about hockey with, of all people, Nikolas Cassadine and Ric Lansing. She was touched to see her dear friend and her boyfriend getting along and thought it wise to bow out now before she got teary-eyed and they thought it was over the recent Stanley Cup series.

She walked into the kitchen and put the bottles in the can she set up just for that purpose and went to stand next to Kelly who was mixing strangely bright colored drinks.

"How are you doing?" Kelly asked, handing Robin a bright blue concoction that Robin eyed warily. "Oh, drink it. You'll love it."

Robin shrugged and took a sip. "This is pretty good. What's in it?" she said in surprise.

"Old family recipe," Kelly smiled slyly. "You seemed to have calmed down."

"Maybe he won't come. It's been a couple of hours."

"Actually." Lainey shared a look with Kelly. "Matt called and said he was coming."

"He called? He has our number?" Robin yelled out in agitation then looked around nervously before she realized that no one could hear her over the din of the crowd and the loud music.

"You didn't give it to him?" Lainey recrossed her legs which were on display below the hem of her slinky blue dress, which come to think of it, Robin realized, matched her drink.

Robin shook her head, looking panicked. "Maybe I should tell Patrick now?" She licked some blue slush off her lip.

"You two weren't even together when it happened, it's none of his business," Kelly said. "And even if you two were still involved at the time it was no strings, as he loved to keep pointing out."

"That doesn't mean he won't be upset if he finds out," Lainey said.

"How would he find out? Just keep them apart at the party and it'll be fine," Kelly shrugged.

"I hate lying."

"It's not lying, it's none of his business," Kelly insisted.

"Okay, wow. I thought we had an eclectic bunch already with the entire Quatermaine, Scorpio clans here and the hospital PCPD crowds, but this just about takes that cake," Lainey said, her eyes glued to the door.

Robin walked around the counter to where Lainey was sitting. Her jaw just about dropped at the sight of Jason Morgan walking into a party, especially one at her apartment.

"I didn't know he went to parties," Kelly commented, leaning over the counter and watching as Jason looked around before spotting Robin. The hitman, to her amusement, looked uncomfortable. "Unless it's to work. Don't let him shoot anyone here, Robin!"

Robin put her drink down on the counter next to Lainey and walked up to Jason. "Hello, Jason. I didn't expect to see you here." She looked up at him worriedly. "Is everything all right? Are you okay?"

Jason looked around blankly before answering. "Is this all right? That I came? Emily told me about it."

"Of course. I just never…you know." She was at a loss for words. "Do you want a drink?"

Jason shook his head, his eyes still scanning the crowd.

"Are you looking for someone?" Robin asked, tensing up.

Jason shook his head again.

Robin sighed in relief.

"I just wanted to see your new home. See how you were doing." His flat eyes bored into her.

"Why?" she asked in genuine curiosity as Jason stared at her blankly. She sighed again. Did they used to talk? Did he? "How about I show you around?"

Jason nodded and followed her.

Kelly and Lainey shared a weirded out look and took stiff sips of their drinks. Lainey's was purple and Kelly's was yellow.

* * *

"What the hell is he doing here?" Patrick hissed as he caught sight of Robin leading Jason Morgan through the crowd.

"He's single now. Probably looking to recycle through old girlfriends," Ric commented cynically into his beer. "He was sniffing around Elizabeth for a while."

"Well, Robin's not available." Patrick started to walk off, but Nik grabbed his shoulder. "What?" the doctor snapped at the younger man.

"Robin is too smart to go back there and if you go over there acting all macho all your going to do is piss her off," Nik advised.

"Since when are you interested in giving me advice with Robin?" Patrick asked, but stopped resisting Nik's pull.

"Since I saw how happy she looks with you. Just make sure she stays that way."

"Oooh a Cassadine threat." Ric snorted. Nik looked at him in surprise. "Just trying to lighten the mood." Ric shrugged.

"You're Patrick Drake aren't you?" A voice behind Patrick called out.

"Yeah, you're…?" Patrick hadn't noticed the tall, sandy-haired, blue eyed man walk up to him. He vaguely recognized him from his short-time on the sports bar circuit when he first moved to Port Charles. Patrick took the proffered hand and shook it.

"Dr. Matt Rucker. Mercy. Oncology. We met a few times out on the circuit. You must work with Robin?"

TBC


	11. Chapter 11

_I guess it turned into one of those Port Charles parties where everyone shows up, after all! And as for the angst…what's the rush! _

**Eleven **

_"Dr. Matt Rucker, Mercy. Oncology. We met a few times out on the circuit. You must work with Robin?"_

"Yes." Patrick frowned at the familiar use of Robin's given name. "Have you…"

"I'm Nikolas Cassadine, this is Ric Lansing." Nikolas leaned past Patrick and shook the doctor's hand. Patrick stepped back before he was knocked over.

Nikolas was tipsy. On beer and Emily's renewed attention. Patrick chuckled at the Mercy doctor's surprised expression at having a dour Cassadine practically knock him down and introduce himself.

"Nice to meet you Mr. Cassadine." Matt's voice was filled with the appropriate reverence for a large donor to General Hospital. Although his full lips curved into a smile at Nikolas' insistence that he call him "Nik." Matt shook his hand and then turned to Ric. "I remember when you were D.A. and now your wife is. It's really nice to meet you. I'm a Harvard man myself." Ric and Matt started a conversation about Harvard and their experiences there.

Patrick's attention wandered from the Ivy League conversation as he looked around for where Robin and Jason had gone. What the hell, he wondered, was the gangster hit man doing at a house warming party? Was there any truth to Ric's statement that now that Sam was out of the picture he was looking to fill the gap?

"Robin must be really busy. What's it like to work with her?" Matt asked Patrick, interrupting his thoughts.

Patrick turned back at the questions. "She's an amazing doctor and definitely a workaholic." Patrick licked his bottom lip and looked at the oncologist curiously. "How exactly…"

"Oh, god! I'm so sorry!" Kelly slammed into Patrick's back sloshing her yellow drink all down the back of his shirt.

Patrick yelped and jumped away, slamming into Ric and Matt and sending them flying into another group of people.

"You really should go change. Did you bring another shirt?" Lainey grabbed Patrick's arm.

"Or maybe another little towel?" Kelly called out as she took the napkins Anna handed her and began to wipe up the mess she had made on the parquet floor.

"What's going on here?" Anna kneeled down facing Kelly and handed her more napkins. "You were aiming for him."

Kelly looked around. "That man." She motioned her head towards Matt who was still talking to Nikolas and Ric and now the other people they had knocked into. "We need to keep him away from Patrick." Anna kept looking at Kelly like she was crazy. "For Robin," Kelly said slowly.

Understanding came over Anna's face. "Consider it done." She stood up and scoped out the room.

* * *

"What happened?" Robin exclaimed as Patrick was pushed into and through her room into the _ensuite_ bathroom by Lainey. Robin left Jason standing in the middle of her room and followed. "What is on your back?"

"Your other roommate's drink. What the hell is in that stuff? It feels like it's eating through my shirt!" Patrick hastily unbuttoned his shirt and tossed it into the sink.

Robin looked at Lainey questioningly. Lainey widened her eyes and made motions with her hands. Robin looked at her like she was crazy. Lainey blew out a breath. "Patrick was talking to Ric, Nik and Matt, when Kelly was jostled by the crowd into Patrick's back."

Robin's eyes widened and she cleared her throat. She gave Lainey a thankful look.

"Can I get some help here?" Patrick held up a washcloth and presented his back to Robin.

"Uh, yeah." Robin grabbed the cloth and ran it under the water and put some soap on it before starting to wipe down Patrick's back.

"Is everything all right?" Jason asked from the doorway.

"Everything is fine, Jason. Why don't we get you a drink?" Lainey walked towards Jason, not touching him, but crowding him out. Or trying to, because Jason didn't move, his eyes locked on Robin who was sponging off Patrick's back.

"I'm fine, Jason," Robin reassured him.

Jason nodded and walked away. Lainey gave Robin a look and then followed, closing the door behind him.

"What did the Morgan have to say?" Patrick paused. "Or stare?"

Robin rolled her eyes. "He just wanted to see my new home and he had some questions related to Sam." She dropped the cloth into the sink and toweled off Patrick's back.

"Does his sudden interest have to do with the fact that he's single now?" Patrick turned around and looked down at Robin.

"I highly doubt that," Robin said lightly. "Do you have another shirt? Pants too." Robin grimaced at the big yellow stain on Patrick's ass.

"In my bag. What? I packed extra in case I stayed a while. Or was accosted by your crazy roommates and their lethal drinks," he explained when she raised her eyebrows at him. He pressed a kiss to her head as he passed and went back into the bedroom to retrieve fresh clothes.

Robin closed her eyes and blew out a breath, then followed him. She stood in the doorway and watched him get dressed, her brow furrowed.

"What?" Patrick paused buttoning his shirt and looked at Robin.

Robin cleared her throat and walked a few steps into the bedroom. "There's something I should tell you. I mean I don't have to, because we weren't together and even when we were we really weren't. So maybe you don't need or even want…"

"Robin! You need to get out here!"

Robin and Patrick's heads whipped around to look at Epiphany standing her hand on the doorknob and her face furious.

"Jason Morgan and Ric Lansing are trying to kill each other out there."

Robin frowned and looked back at Patrick.

"Come on. Let's go help Ric."

"Patrick!" Robin exclaimed.

Patrick shrugged and finished buttoning his shirt and then went to follow Robin out of her bedroom into the melee.

TBC


	12. Chapter 12

**Twelve **

Robin walked back into the loft to find utter chaos.

The Quatermaines were standing to one side sipping their drinks and shaking their heads at the ruckus. Edward could be heard loudly commenting how Jason Morgan was no grandson of his. Alan was restraining Monica who wanted to protect her precious adopted son.

Lainey and Kelly were watching and commenting on how glad they were they had all decided to not unpack any breakables until after the party and that much of their furniture hadn't been delivered yet.

Emily was pleading with a drunken Nik to intervene and alternately yelling at her brother to stop pounding on the less than agile attorney.

Alexis was yelling at Ric at the same time that she was taking notes in her PDA in case she had to prosecute a case out of this. Wouldn't it be great, she thought, if she could get Morgan on something as simple as a fight?

Lucky Spencer and Mac were trying to break up the fight while Noah was holding Anna's drink as she contemplated whose ass she was going to kick first for making a scene at her daughter's party.

The staff from Mercy was congregated together stunned and excited by the melee. The violence of the Corinthos gang rarely touched their hospital unless there was an overflow of victims from a particularly brutal turf battle.

The rest of the party was trying to stay out of the way. Some were still on the deck ignoring the events inside, others were watching and cheering on their favorites.

"All right! Enough!" Robin walked straight into the fray that reminded her forcibly that she indeed was back home and not in her dreary Parisian life. Her mother jumped in right behind her. The women proved to be enough of a distraction that Mac and Lucky were able to pull the combatants apart. Anna's fist slamming into both Ric and Jason's stomachs helped.

"Stay the hell away from Sonny!" Jason snarled at Ric, straining against the hold that Mac and Patrick had on his arms. Jason's guards hovered behind him waiting for a signal to intervene.

"Shut up!" Anna yelled before Ric could respond.

"I don't think we need to ruin your niece's party further by pressing charges." Alexis took hold of her husband's arm and looked at Mac.

"As long as you all leave peaceably." Mac gave Jason and Ric pointed looks. He really hated these mobsters.

"Please, Jason," Liz requested of Jason, ignoring Lucky's irritated expression at his wife talking to the mobster. When she pressed a wet towel to Jason's face he stepped forward to stop her, but Robin put her hand on his chest, silently asking him to not make a further scene.

While Robin, Anna and her roommates were diffusing the tense situation, Patrick stepped back from Ric and went to stand with his father. "Was this town always this crazy?" Patrick asked.

"To say the least. Although, it was mainly Luke and Robert at the center of it, not these mobsters and the insecure trophy women who need their validation to feel worthwhile," Noah said.

"That was quite a mouthful, Dad." Patrick laughed.

"I did a lot of psychological reading in rehab." Noah shrugged self-deprecatingly.

"We don't get much of this action at Mercy," Dr. Matt Rucker walked over to Patrick and Noah. "It must keep you busy at GH."

"On the bright side I get to practice a lot of new techniques. Usually on Morgan himself or the people around him," Patrick commented.

"Patrick!" Noah gasped.

"Hey, if he wants to live a life of violence." Patrick shrugged, unconcerned and took a sip of his beer.

Noah shook his head and walked off to find Anna Devane. He knew there was no use in lecturing his son, especially since he wasn't all that wrong anyway, just inappropriate.

* * *

"Why the hell did that Morgan show up anyway?" Robert Scorpio asked his daughter as they watched Alexis drag her husband out of the loft. "He'd better stay away from you. I won't have that criminal element hanging around." He pointed his bottle at his brother. "If you can't do anything about it, I will."

"What exactly are you implying, Robert?" Mac put his beer down and glared at his brother.

"You know exactly what I mean!" Robert bit out and took a step towards his brother.

"I did my best by your girl while…"

"Mom," Robin pleaded with her mother to intercede.

"Not another fight at our adult daughter's apartment." Anna stepped in between the snarling Scorpios and put a hand on each of their chests. "Robin decides who she hangs out with or not."

"I wouldn't expect less from you given your attraction to the same type of guys," Robert observed bitterly.

"Is it past your bedtimes or something?" Robin rolled her eyes. "Just have a good time already." Robin picked up Mac's beer and handed it to him as Anna manhandled Robert back a few paces. The brothers shared a look, peace made, and struck up another conversation.

"Thanks, Mom." Robin handed her mother a glass of wine. "It looked like you and Noah Drake were having a good time earlier?" Robin took a sip of her own glass of wine. She had long ago trashed Kelly's concoction.

"Oh god," Anna exclaimed.

"He is that hot…" Robin trailed off when she saw her mother's attention was not on her.

"What?" Robin turned around to see what she was looking at. It was Dr. Matt Rucker talking with Patrick on the other side of the living area.

"Go over there, interrupt them," Anna pushed her daughter.

"If he's going to find out…"

"It shouldn't be in the middle of your party. Go." Anna pushed her daughter again.

Robin walked through the crowd to Patrick's side. She knew she had no reason to feel guilty or nervous; she just hated not being completely honest. Something bad always happened when she didn't tell the truth. Or, she thought ruefully, when she did.

"Hello, Robin." Dr. Matt Rucker said when Robin walked up to them.

"Hello, Matt." Robin put her hand on Patrick's back and he put his arm around her and pulled her to his side.

"So, Matt, you didn't tell me how you know my girlfriend"

TBC


	13. Chapter 13

Thirteen

_"So, Matt, you didn't tell me how you know my girlfriend"_

Matt's eyes darted to look at Robin in surprise when Patrick referred to her as his girlfriend. Patrick took this as surprise at the infamous Patrick Drake having a girlfriend and he grinned widely. "Yes, I was finally caught. That's why you haven't seen me around. She just wouldn't let up with the pursuit." Robin flushed, but Patrick completely misunderstood the cause, thinking it was because of his teasing.

"How long have you two been together?" Matt asked, his voice rough.

"It's been a while," Patrick said lightly.

"A day," Robin said at the same time.

"It's been a really long day." Patrick licked his lips and grinned when Robin jabbed him in the side with her finger. "How is it you two know each other. Did Robin do a consult for you?"

Robin looked at Matt pleadingly, her heart pounding. She couldn't force words out either to lie or tell the truth.

"I met Robin and her roommates out a few weeks ago." Matt took a sip of his beer and looked at Robin pointedly. "I guess she didn't mention it."

"Patrick and I weren't on speaking terms then," Robin explained. "Or even dating."

"That's true. But eventually I knew she'd wouldn't be able to resist…"

"How about you give it a rest boy." Robert Scorpio's hand clamped down on Patrick's shoulder near his neck and squeezed in just such a way that Patrick's entire body spasmed.

"Dad, let go of him!" Robin exclaimed as Matt looked on horrified. She grabbed onto her father's immovable arm and pulled.

Robert ignored her and looked at the doctor from Mercy. "I believe your friends are waiting for you by the door and it's time for you to go." He smiled nastily. Anna had tried to be discreet in sending him over to interrupt, but he had read between the lines. The man had sex with his daughter and he would gladly kill him. Same went for Patrick, for that matter.

"Um, sir, could you let go of me now?" Patrick gasped.

Robert let go and made an advance at the blond doctor. "It was a great party. Bye." Matt turned around and rushed off.

Robert turned to his daughter who was massaging Patrick's neck and winked at her. Robin's jaw dropped. "Great party, luv. Best get back to it." He winkled his fingers at Patrick and walked off. Robin watched him go with a strange look on her face. She didn't know whether to be grateful, mortified or guilty.

"What was that about?" Patrick asked, rubbing the back of his neck. Then his eyes took on an evil glint. "Can you teach me that?"

"What for?" Robin asked, not admitting that she did in fact know how to do that.

"It might come in handy someday."

"When? On who?"

Patrick shrugged and took a sip of the beer that he retrieved from the floor where it had dropped when Robert had put the oogie on him. He was still grinning evilly.

Robin put her hands on her face and groaned. She definitely needed a drink.

* * *

"Don't tell him," Kelly said.

"I agree. He's a dog, he can't throw stones," Liz said.

"Hey!" Robin looked at Liz in annoyance. One minute Liz was practically panting on Patrick's shoes and the next she was putting him down. And then in the next she was oozing all over Jason. She was irritated on both Patrick and Lucky's behalf. She planned to have a private word with the nurse if things didn't change soon.

"I keep telling you it's none of his business." Kelly was loading the blender carafes into the dishwasher.

"If he finds out some other way he's going to feel betrayed," Lainey predicted.

"Men never take that kind of thing well, even if you do tell him," Emily said, her being a veteran of many twisted and overlapping relationships.

"I hate lying."

"It's not lying. You weren't together then. What's the point of telling him about the hot doc from Mercy?" Kelly said.

"You really think he's hot?" Emily asked. Everyone ignored her.

"I'm going to tell him." All the women turned to face him. "I appreciate all the advice, but I have to go with my gut here."

"Did you at least get his number?" Kelly asked. "What? He is cute." She shrugged when everyone gave her an exasperated look.

The women started chattering, berating Kelly or talking on other things. Robin smiled. She really liked having her friends around.

* * *

"Good night!" Patrick waved comically as Lucky and Emily helped Nikolas out of the loft. "Your friends are entertaining."

"How do you figure that?" Robin asked as she slid the door shut and locked it.

"Well, your family too. There's the James Bond move your dad pulled. Your mother hitting on my father…"

"Your father was hitting on my mother!" Robin defended. "It was mutual, anyway," she finished lamely.

"We could end up related, which in Port Charles probably wouldn't raise an eyebrow. Then there was the drunken Greek Prince. Or is it Russian? Who lives on a spooky island with his butler named Alfred and whose ex-wife is the girlfriend of a mobster who will probably try to kill him when he finds out she's hanging out with her ex-husband again. Then there are your roommates and their brightly colored drinks that could double as lime and mildew remover. And we can't forget the hitman ex-boyfriend. Oh, I mean coffee importer," Patrick corrected snidely at Robin's look. "Showing up and picking a fight with the half-brother of the mobster he is unusually close to and shares women with."

"Patrick. Shut up."

"Make me." Patrick put his hands on his hips and grinned down at her.

"All right." Robin stood on her tiptoes and wrapped her arms around his neck.

* * *

Robin rolled over and looked at the bedside clock. 3 a.m. She turned back over and looked at a sleeping Patrick. She reached a finger out and traced over his gorgeous features. She pulled back when she shifted in his sleep, when he stayed asleep she dropped her head to the pillow and kept looking at him. One day, two now, they'd been together and she was already agonizing over a secret. She could have told him tonight, but she hadn't wanted to ruin the night. Their lovemaking, and she could call it that now even though they hadn't said they were in love yet, was incredible. Her entire body was still tingling. She was tempted to wake him for more, but he actually had a consult in the late morning.

These was so different than the experience she had shared with Matt Rucker, her first and only try at having sex without at least friendship and it had been a bust. It was cold and left her feeling cheap. It had no place between her and Patrick tonight. Maybe not ever, she thought, as Patrick's own words echoed in her mind. How many times had he told her to put aside knowledge that didn't impact her or them? How many times had he accused her of creating unreasonably high standards to keep people at bay? Or that she overanalyzed things and made them a bigger deal than they were? That, she rolled over onto her back and looked up at the pattern of moonlight on the ceiling, was probably what she was doing now. She hadn't asked Patrick who he was with when they were together or apart, he had volunteered that it had not gone all the way. Why would he care what she had done and with whom while he was busy proving he didn't have feelings for her?

She hadn't cheated on him, couldn't have possibly have cheated on him before yesterday. They were unlikely to cross paths again with Matt Rucker again and even if they did, Patrick of all people wouldn't care that she'd busted out and did what he had always done. He'd probably be impressed, if anything at her lame attempt to get him out of her mind. Probably take it as some kind of ego boost. Robin rolled her eyes and moved backwards on the bed. At her touch, Patrick rolled over and curved his body around hers. In his arms, she drifted off to sleep.

TBC


	14. Chapter 14

**Fourteen **

"What are you doing here, Ms. Devane?" Dr. Noah Drake put the files he was carrying down on the counter and passed them to the waiting nurse. "Are you looking for Robin?"

"Actually, I'm not. I know that Robin has a consult right now." Anna smoothed down her red summer dress.

"Probably with my son." Noah grinned knowingly and leaned against the counter and in towards Anna. "Who are you here to see?"

"You." Anna leaned in closer.

"To what do I owe the pleasure?" Noah's grin widened.

"I came to see if I could take you to lunch."

"I'm not turning you down, of course, but I am curious as to why." He tilted his head and studied her features with obvious appreciation.

"Can't it just be because you're cute?" Anna asked, a sly smile on her face.

Noah laughed. "While I am devastatingly handsome…"

"And modest."

"Now." Noah waggled his finger at Anna. "I've never been accused of that. While I am irresistibly attractive, I bet you've convinced yourself you have another reason for wanting to spend time in my company. For pride's sake." His brown eyes twinkled in good humor.

"The apple definitely did not fall far from the tree. You are incorrigible and arrogant like your son." Anna crossed her arms and looked up at the amused doctor.

"And do you find it as irritating and compelling as your daughter does? Because if you do I can really ratchet it up." He licked his bottom lip and then bit it in an endearing and sexy manner.

Anna groaned and put her hands on the lapels of his white coat and pulled him forward until his lips were hovering just above hers. "How about we skip lunch and go straight to dessert?" Anna growled.

"What if I was hungry?" Noah's voice was husky.

"I already know you're hungry. You told me so when you left me the voice mail."

"Shhhh. Not Here!" Noah said, looking around wildly.

"Our children are otherwise occupied, they're still none the wiser." Anna chuckled and pulled him towards the elevator.

* * *

"Did you remember to lock the door?" Patrick asked as he nibbled on Robin's ear and pushed her lab coat off her shoulders.

"Supply closet doors do not lock from the inside." Robin closed her eyes and tilted her head back to give him better access to her neck. Her hands were busy untying the waistband of his scrubs.

"Someone could come in," Patrick needlessly pointed out.

"Afraid someone will catch you with your pants down?" As she asked his pants dropped down to his ankles and she traced her fingers over his cloth encased arousal eliciting a groan.

"Aren't you afraid someone will think you're just another notch on my stethoscope?" Patrick finished unbuttoning her shirt and pushed it over her shoulders to land on top of her lab coat.

"Not when you've walked around the hospital telling everyone I'm yours." Robin rolled her eyes and arched into him. "Now, shut up and do me."

"What has gotten into you?" Patrick laughed and slid his hands underneath her skirt and pushed it up to her waist and then lifted her onto the laundry cart.

"Not you, yet." Robin wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled him down on top of her.

* * *

"How did I get roped into this again?" Patrick grunted as he carefully put his end of the red couch he and Robert Scorpio were carrying down on the ground.

"Boyfriend duty, mate," Robert advised his daughter's boyfriend with the wisdom of the ages in his tone.

"At least we get dinner out of this." Patrick sighed when Kelly requested they turn the couch in another direction.

"Did you see that episode of _Felicity_?" Lainey asked.

"I was in Paris. You watched _Felicity_?" Robin asked.

"I did. Especially the episode where they have the hot guys from across the hall move the couch around so they can check out their assets. Why are they wearing their shirts?" Kelly crossed her arms. "And why didn't we ask the other Dr. Drake, too?"

Lainey let out a yelp of laughter and told the men that they were done with the couch and to get started on the chair. "We need to rent the DVDs so Robin can get educated in the pop culture she's missed," she said seriously.

"Can someone pay attention here?" Patrick called out, dropping his side of the chair causing Robert to exclaim in annoyance.

"Did you know your boyfriend was such a whiner, Robin?" Lainey asked with a grin on her face.

"And a wimp. It's just a little chair," Kelly put in.

"If it's so little why don't you do it?" Patrick asked in exasperation, his hands on his hips.

"Actually, I think it looks fine there," Robin bit her lip to keep from laughing.

"Great. We're done!" Patrick threw up his arms. "I'm not risking these hands again, so don't be getting any ideas." Robert rolled his eyes and took a glass of iced tea from Lainey. He smiled at her appreciatively.

Robin walked up to Patrick and took his hands in her own and kissed each one. "Thank you for risking your hands for my and my roommates' decorating whims." She looked up at him and smiled sweetly. "I guess you really like me."

"I told you not to tell me what I like." He winked. "But yeah." He leaned down and kissed her. "I guess I must."

"Hey, father over here." Robert waved at them, not looking the slightest bit uncomfortable.

Robin pulled back, ducked her head and blushed. Patrick smiled down at her, thinking how cute she looked when flustered by her father. Then he turned his head and looked at Robert and they shared a grin, both happy that she was happy.

"What's for dinner?" Robert asked.

Robin mumbled something unintelligible and went to hide out in the kitchen.

* * *

Robin walked out of her bedroom back into the dining area to find her roommates had cleared the salad plates and were serving dinner.

"Do you have to go in?" Kelly asked as she put a bowl of steamed green beans down on the larger, Asian-inspired dining room table.

She nodded. "There's been an accident." Robin looked at Patrick. "A teenaged boy on a motorcycle."

Patrick had stood up from the table when she came back into the room. At her quiet disclosure he walked forward and put his hands on her shoulders. "Do you want me to come with you?" he asked quietly.

"No. You stay and have dinner. Thanks for helping. I'll call you and let you know if I have to stay," she told Patrick. "Thanks, Pop."

"I'll walk you downstairs." Patrick waited while she grabbed her purse and then walked out with her.

"The life of a doctor," Lainey observed in sympathy as she sat down next to Robert and passed him the plate of grilled fish.

"Kind of like the life of a spy, you never get to enjoy dinner."

"But you're not a spy now, you're a security guard on the Haunted Star," Kelly said, sitting down on the other side of him.

"Uh uh uh. Security consultant," he corrected, waggling his finger at her.

"How about sharing some spy stories with us?" Kelly asked as she took the plate of fish from him.

"There was this time an old mate of mine Sean and I were in Berlin…."

The two beautiful, female doctors leaned in and listened raptly.


	15. Chapter 15

**Fifteen**

Robin closed her bedroom door and leaned back against it and let out a tired groan. It was the middle of the night and it had been a long time since she had lived with other people and she had forgotten how tricky it was to come in quietly while roommates are sleeping. As a consequence, she was tense and completely unprepared for the voice that comes out of the darkness.

"Welcome home."

Robin gasped and turned on the light. She smiled and pressed her hand against her chest. "I didn't know you were still here." She turned the light back off as Patrick reached for the bedside light.

"I was too traumatized to leave. I just crawled into your bed and curled up and began drooling," Patrick said dramatically, his arm bent over his eyes.

"What are you talking about? Was my father mean to you? Did he ask you about your intentions towards me again?" She teased as she walked over and sat down on the edge of the bed and let him snake his arm around her waist and pull her against him.

"When I came back upstairs I could swear your roommates were flirting with your father and he was flirting back. He told old spy stories all night." Patrick brushed some hair that had gotten loose from Robin's pony tail off her neck.

"I'm sure it was just hero worship."

"Until you walk in on them having sex."

"Ewwww." Robin scrunched her nose and closed her eyes. Then she sighed.

"Tough case?" he asked, his voice gruff with sleep.

She nodded. "I have to go back. We're going to start administering the drug combination in a couple of hours. He'll have been stable long enough by then." She snuggled against him, still on top of the covers. "Jeremy Gilmarten's parents got him a motorcycle for his nineteenth birthday. It was his first ride. He collided with a truck."

"Was he wearing a helmet?" Patrick pressed a kiss to Robin's hair.

"Yes. It saved him. You're so warm."

"Why don't you catch a nap before you go back?"

"I don't have time. I just came home to change and pick up what I need for tomorrow," she said, referring mainly to her HIV meds.

"Then take a shower at least. That I insist on, you'll be feel better." He sat up, the sheet dropping to his waist. Robin reached over and slid her hand up his naked chest. "And I'll join you." He smirked and pressed her hand against his heart. "I'll go get the water started. You get undressed. Or I'll do that for you too."

"Promises, promises," Robin rolled over and grumbled as he stood up and walked into the bathroom. She enjoyed the view of his firm, naked ass as long as she could.

* * *

"I thought you'd fallen asleep," Patrick said as he held the shower door open. 

"Almost." Robin swiveled her neck, trying to stretch out the kinks from standing in the lab and preparing her drug combination.

"Here." Patrick put his hands on her shoulders and walked her into the running shower. He closed the door behind him and began to knead Robin's taut muscles as the water sluiced over her naked body and flattened her hair against her head and shoulders.

"That feels so good," she moaned. Her eyes were closed as she gave herself over to Patrick's TLC.

"You ain't felt nothing yet," Patrick promised.

"I can actually hear the leer in your bad grammar." Robin laughed and reached behind her and grabbed onto Patrick's hips as she pressed herself back against him.

Patrick breathed out his nose and licked his lips. He slid his hands from Robin's neck and down the slick, wet front of her to cup her breasts. She smiled and shimmied her hips, rubbing herself against him.

"I just suggested a therapeutic cleansing. It seems like you have different ideas," Patrick grumbled into Robin's ear, his quick breathes betraying the faux innocence of his words.

Robin reached over to the shower caddy in the corner and pushed the shampoo over and pulled out a hiding condom. "Just my idea?" she waved it in front of Patrick's face.

"Well." Patrick nibbled on her shoulder, his lips stretched into unrepentant grin. "I know how rambunctious you get in the shower."

Robin laughed and turned around and slid her arms around Patrick's neck and wrapped herself against him. "You naked and wet have that effect on me."

"Funny, I was thinking the same thing about you."

"Who knew we'd ever have so much in common?" Robin grinned before Patrick covered her lips with his own.

* * *

"I know how to take care of myself, Noah." Anna stood by the window looking out into the night sky over Port Charles. It was a damp evening and from Noah's brownstone apartment the city looked cleansed and comforting. She wished she could avail herself of the same experience. 

"You think I don't know that or that I'm threatened by that?" Noah stood a few feet from her, his hands on his hips. Behind him, the unmade bed glowed in the moonlight coming in through the window. He was clad only in his hastily donned boxer-briefs, while Anna was wrapped only in the white silk sheet from the bed. They had just spent the afternoon into the evening making love, before Noah was called away to the hospital. He had just returned to find Anna studying surveillance photos of Lorenzo Alcazar that she had tried to hide when he returned.

In truth, Noah's manhood was somewhat threatened by the reality that Anna didn't need his protection, but not enough for him to throw away what they were building together. Or rather, what they had been building before Anna had coldly informed him tonight that they would have to continue to meet in secret or they would have to step back – not because of her concern over their children's reactions, but because of her work. More specifically, because she had to continue to get close to Lorenzo Alcazar.

It was his carefully worded question – "Will you be sleeping with him" that had tilted everything on its axis tonight.

He hadn't said it out loud, but in his eyes she could see that he thought her quiet affirmation made her someone who had sex for a living. Or maybe, she thought to herself that was how she felt. She took a deep breath and tried to steel herself; it didn't work. Her heart still quivered in her chest. She had never given this kind of thing a second thought. Not even when she and Robert were involved and he knew what she had to do; not when she was involved with any other man who probably didn't. Why did she feel differently now.

She closed her eyes and swallowed when Noah's strong hand closed over her bare shoulder. She felt a tingling through her entire body. She had thought she was sated. She wanted him again. She could turn this all off and force it away and walk away if she had to. She felt his breath stir her hair. She didn't want to.

"Anna."

His gruff, melodic voice filled her up inside. She turned her head to look at him. "I can't say I have much experience with this kind of thing, but I'm willing to make it work." He paused and licked his lips. "Picturing you with him will make me want to kill him." He smirked. "Something I'm fully unqualified to do relative to you, mind you, but I'm not going to stop being concerned about your well-being. Life is too short to give up whatever it is we have between us." When she turned to face him he put his hand on her waist and leaned over her. "What do you want?"

"I want you." She shivered when she put her arms around his torso and let the sheet drop to the floor. "I want to lock myself up in here with you and for the first time in a long time I want to not be doing this job. But I have to finish what I started." She pressed herself against him. "With the job and with you."

Noah closed his eyes and stroked her hair and wrapped herself up with him. "I'm falling in love with you, Anna Devane." His quiet words were a powerful force inside that room and inside Anna. She knew he meant what he said and she knew what it meant to him. What surprised her was what it meant to her.

"I'm falling in love with you, too, Noah. That's why I need to protect you from this." She looked up at him. "And I need to let you protect me. I don't know when we can be together again."

"Right now. We'll make the rest work." He leaned down and lifted her up and carried her to the bed.

* * *

"Did you have a fight with the good doctor, Anna?" 

Anna had heard Robert's steps coming up behind her on the docks, they were not the surprise, his words were. She turned around and faced her ex-husband and ex-partner, her expression deliberately bland. "Good evening, Robert."

"So formal, Ms. Devane." Robert's eyes sparkled as he leaned into Anna's personal space. "What happened with the lothario doctor, Anna? Did your mission get in the way of the budding romance?"

"Isn't it a bit late to be hanging out on the docks fishing?" Anna stiffened and raised her chin disdainfully.

"Noah Drake always did have good taste in women." Robert smirked. "I wonder what our daughter would think about you sleeping with her boyfriend's father."

Anna's grabbed Robert's sleeve and glared up at him menacingly. "Watch your step, Robert." His heart was pounding. No one could overhear her involvement with Noah. She should have resisted. "You're jealous delusions could put our daughter's boyfriend's father in danger."

"I would never do that, Anna." Robert put his hand over hers, his word conciliatory, but his expression concerned. "What are you really working on?"

"Stop making wild accusations in public places and I told you I'm here to visit my daughter." She pulled her hand away.

Robert sighed and rubbed his forehead. "Do you think I can't tell when my ex-partner is working on an assignment? You shouldn't be working alone."

"Go home, Robert." Anna made to walk past him.

"Lorenzo Alcazar has gotten in touch with some old acquaintances recently."

His words stopped her. She turned her head to look at him.

"He's not just dealing in arms now and he seems to have an attraction to not just one of my ex-wives."

"I know. Why are you here in Port Charles, Robert?"

"Like you I came to spend time with our daughter." Robert stepped closer to Anna again. "But I did get an interesting phone call a few weeks ago about something going on in my new backyard."

Anna and Robert communicated silently with their eyes.

"Mom? Dad?"

Robert and Anna turned their heads to see Patrick and Robin walking towards them.  
"Hello, darling. Patrick." Anna leaned in and kissed her daughter while Robert had a few words with Patrick. "What are you doing out here so late?"

"I'm going back to work, Patrick is walking me there."

"Good, it's not safe to be wandering around here alone this time of night." Robert nodded approvingly.

Robin looked from her mother to her father and back again. "What are you two doing out here? Together?" she asked curiously.

"I was just telling your mother the same thing. I just left the Haunted Star when I ran into your mother here coming from….where were you coming from, darling?" He grinned evilly.

"You're father is always so nosy. Why don't you call me tomorrow and we'll make plans for lunch." Anna smoothed down her daughter's hair. "Come on old man, walk me home so that I don't hurt any muggers."

"Whatever you say, dear." Robert was still grinning evilly when he kissed his daughter on the side of her head and walked off with his ex-wife.

Robin watched them go and then looked up at Patrick. "You don't think that they're…do you?"

"I don't try to figure your parents out, Scorpio." Patrick put his arm back around Robin's shoulders.

"Good strategy." Robin shook her head and they started walking again.

**TBC**


	16. Chapter 16

**Sixteen**

Noah's eyes followed her as she walked around the nurse's station. It was stupid and it was dangerous and he couldn't not drink in the sight of her.

It had been two weeks since he'd had little more from her than a furtive voice mail left on an untraceable and ever changing voice mail box, the number and codes for which were left for him in random places like under his hotel room door or in his hospital locker. From the vague comments of his son and the much less than vague expostulations from Robert Scorpio he knew that Anna Devane had been making startling inroads into Lorenzo Alcazar's sphere. He was going crazy with worry and with missing her. They had only known each other a matter of months and already he missed her presence in his life as if she had been a part of it for years. He didn't know how much of that was real and how much of that was displacement.

He had discussed the situation with his AA sponsor _ad infinitum_ and heard all the warnings in rehab – don't get involved during the first year of recovery. He knew that his addictive personality made it more than likely that he would transfer his need for obsessive focus onto someone as a replacement for alcohol. But he was also certain that Anna Devane was someone that he could have the miraculous and unexpected opportunity to share another love of a lifetime. The timing couldn't worse.

What should be a joyful journey was not only torturous because it couldn't be acted upon, but was also a danger. Though she hadn't returned the sentiment verbally, he heard it in her voice and even now when she was pretending she didn't notice him he could see her awareness of him in the line of her body. It made his heart soar and at the same time it was a leaden ball in his stomach. He knew she was compromising her safety contacting him. She had told him on more than one occasion that she hadn't felt this kind of threat from within to her professionalism since she and Robert had gotten married the first time and the years she had pretended Robin wasn't her daughter. He hated that he was the source of that and that there was nothing he could do about it.

He was powerless to protect her. He couldn't pick up a gun and shoot the mobster. He wasn't close enough to throw his body in front of hers should her treachery be uncovered and there was no one else he could turn to, Anna had made him promise not to go to Robert Scorpio.

He was trapped. He really, really wanted a drink.

He was startled from his thoughts by an insistent hand waving in his face. He blinked and looked up to see Nurse Epiphany Johnson holding her hand out for the file he had been paused over for the past ten minutes. He waited for a smart remark as he scribbled on the line and snapped the binder shut, but none was forthcoming. "Well?" he asked as he finally handed over the file.

"Well, what, Dr. Drake?" Epiphany put the file in the right place and raised an eyebrow.

"You look like you have something to say. You usually have something to say." Noah leaned on the counter, his eyes still trailing Anna who stood talking quietly with Lorenzo Alcazar while they waited for Skye Chandler Quatermaine to come out of a nearby exam room. It looked intimate to him, although the effect was diluted by Robert Scorpio who had somehow interjected himself into the situation on Skye's side and stood nearby obviously pretending not to see Alcazar's threatening looks or the hand the mobster rested familiarly on his ex-wife's waist.

"You're the one who looks like you have something to say, Dr. Drake, but I'm sure you're smart enough to keep it to yourself." She looked pointedly towards where Noah was looking and the back at the obviously agitated doctor.

God, Noah thought, I really need a drink.

"Epiphany, have you seen, Dr. Scorpio?" Patrick walked over and gave the nurse a charming smile and then smirked at his father, relieved for once to not be on the receiving end of the voluble nurse's life lessons as it looked like his father was. He flipped through the file from his last consult before handing it over to Epiphany.

"She's administering another treatment on the Gilmarten case." Epiphany said before walking away.

Patrick's mouth tightened. Robin had spent virtually day and night at the hospital for the past two weeks with the that patient. When he had seen her she had been tired or distracted. The few nights she had shown up at his place it had been late and she had fallen asleep immediately. He was smarting from the lack of attention and he was worried about her physical and emotional well-being. There was a sense of urgency about her that he hadn't even seen when she trying to treat what he had thought was the love of her life - Jason Morgan.

"Is Nurse Johnson giving you a hard time?" Patrick looked over at his father, hoping for a distraction.

"No, son, she was just giving me a much needed reminder." Noah sighed and slipped his pen into the pocket of his lab coat.

Patrick frowned at his father's visible deflation. His pulse started to race as a familiar sensation trailed down his spine. This was how his father got right before he slipped back into the bottle. His body tightened and he felt his own familiar reaction, the need to berate and walk away. He fought against it. "Have you had lunch yet, Dad?" The words surprised him as much as they surprised his father.

Noah gave him a grateful smile. "Kelly's?" he asked.

A moment later the two Drake men stood at the elevator, each lost in their private thoughts of their absent Devane woman.

* * *

"How is the treatment going?" Patrick put his hand on the back of Robin's neck and rubbed. She stretched her neck and moaned in gratitude. The sound went straight to his groin.

It was past dinner time and he had found her sitting in an empty diagnostic room pouring over Jeremy Gilmarten's latest test results. His most recent MRI's were lit up on the board across from the desk and in front of her were his blood and other labs.

"It's working." Robin looked up and gave Patrick a tired smile when he stopped his massage. He pulled a chair over and sat down next to her.

"When can you come home and get some rest?" He put his hand over hers on the desk.

"Have you missed me, Dr. Drake?" Robin turned her head and gave him a sly smile. Patrick's concern made her glow even through her exhaustion and turmoil.

"It's been a long week, Dr. Scorpio. I'm missing our consultations. I'm afraid my work is going to suffer soon and I know you wouldn't want to be responsible for that." His voice was low and suggestive.

Robin's eyes dipped below Patrick's waist for a moment. "It's your work now?" She leered at him tiredly.

"With you, I'm seriously considering it as a career. At least I think I am. I can hardly remember." His eyes narrowed as if thinking back over two years rather than two weeks.

"Yeah, it must be hard for you." Robin shook her head in mock sympathy.

"You're a cold-hearted woman with a dirty mouth, Dr. Scorpio." Patrick reached into the pocket of his lab coat. "But I have just the thing to soften you up." He pulled out a fudge mocha bar and handed it over.

Robin bounced in her seat and hurriedly unwrapped it. "How did you know that this was just what I needed?" She sighed and bit into the gooey chocolate.

"Am I going to see you tonight?" Patrick asked softly.

Robin stopped attacking her ice cream and looked at him, a soft smile on her lips. "Your place or mine?"

"It could be the linen closet next door. I don't care. Hell, I'll go lock the door now." Patrick motioned towards the door urgently.

Robin looked at her watch and sighed. "I have one more treatment. How are you doing?" She stilled his hand with her own. "It's been a while since I checked in."

"I had lunch with my dad today."

"That's a good thing." Robin started to smile, then she detected something in his expression. "What's wrong? Is Noah all right?"

Patrick looked down and licked his lips. "He seems tense and…distant." Patrick blew out a frustrated breath and stood up and paced once, twice, behind her chair. "I've seen him like this before. This is how he gets before he goes back to the bottle, the few times he tried to get sober before." Patrick looked up and his eyes looked haunted.

"Did you ask him what's going on?"

"He said he was fine and that he was going to meetings every day."

"He's going to meetings and that's good. And it's good that you went to lunch with him. I think having you in his life will be a big help to him while he's going through a rough patch."

"There's something else. You're mother was out there with that mobster guy and your father was there with the pregnant mother of his child."

"It's just work." Robin rubbed her forehead.

"Another headache?" Patrick leaned in and studied her drawn features.

"It's just a side effect of my meds." She shifted uncomfortably and avoided his eyes.

"And lack of sleep. I'm this close to having Alan order you to take off. In fact, this is your last treatment right? You're taking a few days off to rest." And before Robin could protest he threw in something that he knew would diffuse her annoyance at being worried over. "And you're spending them with me."

"And what are we going to do with all this time off?"

"I'm sure we'll think of something." He winked.


	17. Chapter 17

**Seventeen**

"He's not just a patient to you." Patrick brushed the hair off Robin's face. They were lying naked in his bed. It was the morning after Robin administered Jeremy Gilmarten's last treatment. When she had gotten to the Metrocourt she had tried to stay awake long enough to initiate lovemaking, but she could barely have a coherent conversation. Patrick had pressed a kiss to her forehead and urged her to go to sleep. This morning she had awakened him in a most pleasurable way as a reward. Lying there in the afterglow Robin's mind began to wander and he knew it was back at the hospital.

"I care about all of my patients." Robin traced her fingers over Patrick's well-defined chest.

"There's something about this one that's tearing you up inside, which I don't understand since you said the treatment worked."

"It worked as well as it could. Some of the trauma is healed, most of his memory is intact, but he still has significant rehab in his future due to damage I can't fix. He was just lucky enough to avoid surgery."

"Thanks," Patrick said dryly.

"You're a wonderful surgeon, Patrick, but sometimes surgery isn't the best option…."

"You're changing the subject." Patrick interrupted her defensive explanation. "What is it about this patient that's getting to you? You're tied up in knots."

Robin rolled over on to her back and faced the ceiling. "He reminds me of Stone," she admitted quietly.

"Because of his age? Stone was nineteen when he died, right?" Patrick's eyes flickered away for a moment and then back.

Robin unconsciously crossed her arms over her body. "His age is part of it, but it's really his spirit and personality. He has Stone's generosity and optimism. He's not letting this difficulty defeat him. Stone was like that. He knew he was dying and once he accepted it he just made every day he had left the most it could be for himself and for everyone else around him. Jeremy is the same way. He knows he has a stint in rehab ahead of him and he's going to miss a lot of his sophomore year in college and he may have motor limitations for the rest of his life. All he cares about is getting better and making the most of his life." She turned her head and looked at Patrick.

"And you're determined to help him like you couldn't help Stone," Patrick said quietly, brushing hair off her cheek with a feather light touch.

Robin's heart skipped at beat as Patrick voiced what she didn't know if she could say out loud. She nodded and slid her hand into his and turned her body so she was facing him again.

"You didn't just love Stone, you admired him as well." Patrick's voice was gravelly. Robin nodded, watching him carefully as he seemed to be struggling. "He was incredibly lucky."

Robin's heart skipped a beat.

* * *

"I want to talk to you, Drake."

Noah didn't bother to bite back the smirk Robert's authoritative demand elicited. He looked around the hospital hallway and then back at the aging spy approaching him with a determined stride. "Still have a way with people don't you, Scorpio? I thought maybe you were talking to my son." Noah slid his pen into the pocket of his lab coat and crossed his arms.

"Not here." Robert scowled. "Somewhere alone."

"Robert, I didn't think you cared in that way." Noah blinked innocently.

"I can still arrange a nasty accident for you, Drake." Neither man took the threat seriously, but it sucked the momentary feeling of humor out of Noah.

"Then maybe we should go to my office," he suggested with feigned lightness.

Once in Noah's office, Noah walked behind his desk and stood facing Robert. "You're just lucky I don't have any patients to see right now, Robert. What's so important that you storm in here demanding my presence?"

"It's about my ex-wife. My daughter's mother. It's about you putting her in danger."

"I don't know what you're talking about." Noah visibly winced. He knew was a terrible liar.

"I saw you today and you couldn't take your eyes off her and if I noticed Lorenzo Alcazar noticed too." Robert began to pace. "I know that Anna thinks she's too smooth for Alcazar to be on to her – or she knows and it doesn't matter." Robert shook his head, clearly frustrated that he hadn't been able to find out exactly what Anna's assignment was. "But her involvement with you is putting her too close to the edge."

"What involvement?" Noah cleared his throat and looked just past Robert's head.

"Don't play me for a fool, Drake. I know you and my wife are involved and I don't like it one bit."

"Are you worried about me being involved with your _ex-_wife because you're concerned about her safety or because you're jealous?"

Robert leaned over Noah's desk and snarled into his face. "Jealous? This has nothing to do with jealousy! This might be fun for you, but it is not a game. Anna's life is on the line and maybe our daughter's if that mobster gets pissed."

Anger brightened Noah's light brown eyes and he leaned right back into Robert's face.

"A game? You think that I take Anna or Robin's safety lightly? Let me tell you something, Scorpio." Noah jabbed his finger into Robert's chest. "I might not be able to carry a gun and swoop my way into Alcazar's lair to save Anna, but my concern is for Anna's safety and only Anna's safety. Not whether she has feelings for someone else or whether I feel left out because I have nothing else to do but play rent-a-cop for my best friend's sugar mamma."

"There is some life in the old boy yet." Robert leaned back and crossed his arms, a self-satisfied smirk on his face, as if this was the reaction he was hoping to extract.

"If you have nothing constructive to say get the hell out of my office." Noah barely resisted risking his surgeon's hands and punching the aging spy.

"I have plenty of constructive things to say." Robert sat down in one of the chairs in front of Noah's desk.

Seeing that Robert had no intention of leaving, Noah sighed and sat down himself.

"Anna is momentarily dazzled by your aging good looks and charm…"

"If I'm aging, what does that make you?" Noah chuckled.

"She's getting sloppy. Alcazar is no fool and I think he's been on to her since day one."

"And you don't think she knows that?"

"She does." Robert stroked his chin. "I don't know if she's being arrogant or if it's part of her plan, but the attention she's putting on you is proving to be a distraction."

"You've already admitted you don't know what she's up to and she and I haven't seen each other in weeks." The struggle with that was apparent in his voice.

"I know Anna and I know when she's distracted by a pretty face." Robert rolled his eyes thinking of the lowlifes in Anna's past.

"What do you want me to do, pretend to break up with her when we're not even together? This is not some sitcom on television. The only thing I'm interested in hearing is how you're going to protect her." Noah looked up at the ceiling for a moment before looking at Robert again. "And if there's something I can do to help."

"You look too on edge, Drake. I wouldn't want to send you back to the bottle. I don't think my wife or my daughter would appreciate that."

Noah's jaw tightened. He and Robert looked at each other silently.

TBC


	18. Chapter 18

**Eighteen **

"Good luck and I'll see you soon." Robin let go of Jeremy Gilmarten's hand and stepped back as the nurse pushed his wheelchair out of the room. When the door closed she turned around and looked at the now-empty hospital bed. Jeremy was on his way to rehab where he was going to relearn and build on the motor and speech skills that her treatment had helped restore. It was going to be a long, frustrating road and it broke Robin's heart to see it happen to someone so young and so brave.

It was out of her hands now, though, she reminded herself. She straightened her shoulders and walked out of the empty room.

* * *

"I wonder if that place is as nice as it was back in the day or if it's run to seed," Noah smirked at his son who had just told him that he was taking Robin out of town for a few days of rest and relaxation at a resort a couple of hours away from Port Charles. The two surgeons were standing in the doctor's lounge in front of their lockers.

"Took a few conquests there yourself, Dad?" Patrick smirked back. Before the words were out of his mouth he saw the teasing light in his father's eyes dim and a return of the unhappy look that had been in there for weeks now. Something moved uncomfortably in Patrick's chest at the sight. Maybe, he wondered, he and Robin should stick closer to home. "You're welcome to come see for yourself, Dad. In your own room, of course." Patrick tried to make his words casual with a self-satisfied smirk.

"I'm sure a third wheel is just what you and Robin need on your romantic getaway." Noah rolled his eyes and opened his locker.

"Maybe I'm looking for some pointers from the master. You did have quite a reputation in your day." Patrick crossed his arms and tried to look around his father's shoulder into his locker.

Noah turned his head and caught the movement. He stiffened and spun around to face his son. "You want to check for a bottle of liquor? Be my guest!" Noah moved aside and swept his hand in invitation in front of the locker.

Patrick stepped back as if he had been smacked. His body stiffened and his expression went blank.

"You think I haven't seen you and everyone else hovering over me lately waiting for me to end up in the gutter again?" Noah roared. "Don't let me keep you in suspense. I'm dying for a drink. Not literally yet this time because you took it upon yourself to give me your liver. But every second I want it. Every second. So how about you go back to writing your old man off and leave me the hell alone?" Noah slammed his locker shut and stormed past Patrick, at the door he paused and looked back at his son who wasn't facing him and then he walked out of the lounge.

* * *

"You done, yet?"

Robin looked up from her desk to see Patrick standing stiffly in her doorway. "Just finished." She tilted her head and studied him. "You all right?"

"I just need to get out of here." He walked into the office and hunched down on her couch. "I can't remember the last time I took a vacation."

Robin logged off her computer, shooting him concerned looks every few seconds. Then she got up and went to sit down next to him. She put her hand over his on his thigh. "What's up?" she asked quietly.

Patrick shook his head. "Let's just get out of here." His father was going to drink or not regardless of whether he agonized over it. He had promised Robin a vacation and he was going to follow-through.

Robin hesitated for a moment before letting it drop and agreeing to leave.

* * *

There was a nondescript dive bar in every town that catered to hard code drinkers and people who wanted to pretend to live on the edge and in Port Charles it was Jake's. Noah slid his hands into the pocket of his jeans and looked up at the sign, Robert Scorpio's words echoing in his mind. He didn't know who Jake was, he didn't really care, all that mattered was that this was where he was going to get what he needed. This was something that was long overdue.

"I'm sorry, Patrick," he whispered as he took his hands out of his pockets and opened the door and went in.

* * *

"I've been wondering," Robin said into the quiet of the car. It was night out and they had been driving for almost an hour. Patrick's forced good mood had given way to a tense silence almost fifteen minutes ago driving Robin past her understanding girlfriend routine and into her more natural state of prying and fixing.

"What have you been wondering?" Patrick asked absently.

"How long you thought I'd go before I'd force out of you whatever has you so upset."

"I would have lost my shirt if I had bet. I didn't think we'd make it out of the hospital." Patrick's lips quirked into the first genuine smile she'd seen on his handsome face all day. Robin could see it under the strobe effect of the street lights on the country road they were driving on towards the resort.

"It hasn't been easy." Robin sighed dramatically. Then she dropped the humor. "Did you get into a fight with Noah?"

Patrick glanced at her in surprise. "What makes you say that?" He turned his eyes back onto the road.

"You're hurting and there are very few things or people that you allow to hurt you like that. Your father is one of them," Robin said knowingly. "What happened?"

"He wants to drink again." Patrick shrugged with his hands still on the steering wheel.

"Wants to or has?"

"He told me to leave him the hell alone so I'm doing that." Patrick's voice was hard with disappointment and anger.

"He didn't mean it. He needs help. Why don't we go back and…"

"No! I'm not wasting another minute on him!" Patrick took his hand off the wheel and put it over Robin's entwined hands. "He's a big boy. He gets to decide what he does with his life and his body. Let's just have a good time," he added when Robin opened her mouth to argue. "Please. No lectures."

Robin nodded and watched the light flash on and off over Patrick's troubled face.

TBC


	19. Chapter 19

_A/N: There's a method to my madness. Thanks for the wonderful feedback. _

**Nineteen **

"Tell me again why we can't do this for a living?" Patrick mumbled from his sun chaise. They were lying under umbrellas next to the pool, bottles of beer, water and sunscreen sitting on the table between them. The sun was just beginning to set, but neither seemed intent on moving.

"It doesn't pay well?" Robin answered, flexing her toes back and forth.

"I have a trust fund." Patrick picked up his beer and took a sip without sitting up or spilling any. It was a trick he'd worked hard to perfect over the past couple of days.

"You do?" Robin pulled off her sunglasses and rolled over to look at her boyfriend. Her expression intimating she was actually considering the life of luxury.

"Two actually. One from the Drake family and one from my mother's family. Tempted?" Patrick grinned.

"Your mother's family was rich too?"

"My parents' marriage was the fondest wish of both my parents' family since they were infants. They had avoided each other like the plague for years because of it and then ran into each other at some society event and eloped a few weeks later."

"That's amazing. And romantic." Robin sighed and took a sip of water. "What do you want to do for dinner tonight?"

At that Patrick pushed his sunglasses down so he could turn his head and properly leer at his scantily clad girlfriend. Today, she had pulled out a slick, yellow maillot that showed off her compact curves to perfection. After she had put it on back in their room this morning she'd had to put it on again because he had taken his time pulling it off her with his teeth.

Robin rolled her eyes and blushed at the same time. "Dinner? Eating?" she prompted.

Patrick's leer only widened.

"Gah! I'm going to go up to the room to shower. You can sit here and, and do whatever it is you're doing." Robin sat up and shoved her book into her beach bag. "Stop it!" she shrieked when he only continued to leer at her. She could no longer tell if she was hot from the slight sunburn she'd gotten today or from embarrassment.

Patrick licked his lips and sat up. "I'll meet you in the shower." His voice was husky. Robin's blush deepened. She huffed and stood up and stomped away.

Patrick watched her go. Still leering.

* * *

Robin sat on the bed in a towel, the shower running in the other room. She had been about to get under the spray when her cell phone rang with the hospital's number on the caller id. Thankfully, it was only Epiphany returning the message she had left for her that morning. Patrick had refused to check in on Noah, so Robin was doing it for him. Unfortunately, Epiphany was not calling with good news. Robin clicked off the phone and looked down at the ground trying to figure out how she was going to tell Patrick.

"What did she say?"

Robin looked up in surprise. She hadn't heard Patrick return to the room. "Tell me," Patrick insisted when she hesitated.

Robin put her cell phone down on the bedside table and looked at Patrick, her expression troubled. "She said that your father hasn't shown up for work for the past two days." Robin walked over to him. He spun around and walked out of her reach. He pretended to be concentrating on putting his book and towel down on the couch, but really he couldn't bear to be touched just then.

"Why do you look so stricken? This is what he does. I should have known better. I never should have." Patrick put his hands on his hips and looked down at his feet, failing miserably at coming off as uncaring.

"What? Saved his life? Repaired your relationship? Patrick, you don't really think that."

"He obviously doesn't think either is worth saving, why the hell should I?" Patrick turned his head and glared unseeingly towards the setting sun visible through the sliding glass doors.

"It's a disease, Patrick. It's not a valuation on his life or his love for you. We should go back and see if we can help him." Robin kept her voice level and calm.

"No. He's ruined enough of my life. I won't let him take this from you." He turned around and visibly pushed his anger away and his face broke into a happy-go-lucky smile, the smile of the playboy who didn't want to connect with anyone so he didn't get hurt. She knew he was hearing what she was saying and that he would come to what needed to be done in his own time. She would just have to wait and be ready to support him when he was ready. "Now, how about that shower?" He reached out and opened her towel and let is drop to the floor.

"Patrick," she whispered as he put his hands on her.

* * *

"Where are you going?" Patrick's bellow followed Robin out of the bathroom.

Once again she was wrapped only in a towel, this time she was wet having gotten to take her shower and engage in some pretty strenuous and enjoyable water sports with her boyfriend who was finishing up the rest of the shower alone.

"I'm a prune!" Robin laughed as she picked up her cell phone and then walked back over to the bathroom door. "I'm going to order room service."

"Spoilsport!" Patrick yelled out.

"Whiner!" Robin teased back before she slowly closed the bathroom door. Once the door was closed her smile disappeared and she looked at her phone. She knew what she was about to do was definitely in the meddling category and might piss Patrick off, but she couldn't just sit back and do nothing when she knew that Noah was in trouble. She cared about both Drake men too much.

And maybe this wasn't the best idea, but it was the best she could do from a distance. She pressed a button on her phone and put it to her ear.

"Dad? I need for you to do me a favor."


	20. Chapter 20

**Twenty **

"Robert Scorpio! Let me get you a drink. Coleman, get a drink here for my old, dear friend Robert Scorpio, a better psychic friend than…um….who was that who did those commercials?" Noah's question ended on a slur that seemed to reflect the confusion in his mind, as well as his motor skills.

"This is a truly sad sight, Drake." Robert sat down on the stool next to Noah and took the glass of amber liquid that Coleman silently put in front of him. Something in his tone made it sound like a compliment, but his expression was blank.

"Didn't you predict this, Robert? Noah Drake can't handle a little rejection so he turns to the bottle." Noah leaned in close to Robert. "Come to enjoy the show?"

"My daughter called me, she was concerned about you. I guess she was right to be." Robert took a sip of his drink.

"Robin. Awwww. She's a wonderful girl. Good aim with a pitcher." Noah turned and pointed at the supply of beer pitchers behind the bar. "Coleman, my man, keep those away from young Dr. Scorpio please! I don't feel like sobering up just yet."

"It doesn't look like there's any danger of that." Robert took another sip of his drink. "It's not too late for you to let me help you get out of here."

"I'm devoted to my course of action." Noah raised his glass and toasted with the air.

"Your son…"

"Don't talk to me about my son! My son has dealt with this before and gone on to be a better surgeon and man than I could hope to be. And that was before he had Robin. My son will be fine." Noah glared at Robert.

Robert looked at Noah, measuring, considering. Then he reached into his pocket and pulled out a twenty dollar bill. He put it on the bar. "I'm sorry it came to this, Drake. I'll do my best to watch out for your son." He walked out of the bar.

Noah stared into his glass. "You do that." He licked his lips and then picked up his glass.

* * *

"What are you thinking about?" Robin asked.

Patrick and Robin were lying together on the lounger on their room's balcony. They were naked, bathed in the moonlight and wrapped only in a sheet they pulled off the bed. Patrick was stroking Robin's arm and looking up at the moon thoughtfully.

"I was thinking how different my life is right now than it was a year ago."

"I bet." Robin grinned and slid her leg over Patrick's. "You can't even remember her name."

"Whose name?"

"Exactly." Robin smirked up at him. "The woman you were with this night a year ago. Or the next. Or the one before." Robin ticked off with her fingers.

Patrick covered her hands with his. "All right, wise guy." He shook his head and rolled his eyes.

"Am I wrong?" Robin asked when he let go of her hands and tightened his hold around her.

"That wasn't what I was referring to. Not exactly." Robin brushed her fingers over Patrick's bare chest, making him shiver. "A year ago I knew exactly where I was going and how I was going to get there. My career and a bit of fun on the side were the most important things to me. And in most respects I was an orphan." He stopped and was silent for a while.

"And now?" Robin prompted in a soft voice.

"Now." Patrick smiled and tilted his head back and put his hand on the side of Robin's head, pressing it against his chest. "Now, I'm working in upstate New York in a hospital with a fine reputation, though not exactly the normal route to greatness but I know I'll make it work. I have a relationship with my father, although it's kind of rocky right now. And then there's you." He looked down at the top of her head and smiled fondly and waited.

"What about me?" Robin cleared her throat and looked at him. She squirmed slightly at the look in his eyes and he could feel her heart speed up against him.

"I was never going to fall in love. I didn't think it was possible." He traced his fingers over her face. "Here I am in love with a woman who is this strange combination of bookish nerd and adventure girl who never stops lecturing me."

Robin let out a small, startled gasp at his admission and tears pricked her eyes.

"You changed my life, Robin Scorpio. I love you." Patrick's voice was husky with emotion and, it even seemed, disuse of that combination of words.

A couple of tears slid down Robin's cheeks and landed on Patrick's bare skin, causing him to shiver again. "I love you, too, Patrick Drake."

"Of course you do. What's not to love?"

Robin closed her eyes and let out a bark of laughter. "You are...amazing." She opened her eyes and gave him a dazzling smile.

"Well?"

"Well, what?" Robin asked, her brow furrowing in confusion.

"The lecture, I'm waiting for the lecture about my father."

"No lecture. You're going to do the right thing." Robin stretched her arm around his waist and wrapped her hand around his hip. "You always do."

"Only since I met you."

"You're wrong. You were always a good man. You just hid it better." Robin kissed his chest. "So tomorrow morning we go back and try to help Noah?"

"Yes. Tomorrow we go back to try and help my father. But tonight, tonight is for us." Patrick rolled over and maneuvered Robin underneath him.


	21. Chapter 21

**Twenty-One**

"You sure you want to do this alone?" Robin hesitated before getting out of Patrick's sports car.

This morning they had discovered that Noah had checked out of the Metrocourt. It wasn't hard to find where he had gone. Upset and disappointed, Patrick dove into rounds and a scheduled surgery. Now, he was dropping Robin off at the rehab center where she was going to check on a patient and was going to try and get through to his dad.

Patrick nodded, his lips pressed into a thin line.

"Remember that he loves you and you love him." Robin clasped his hand.

"I'll remember I love you." Patrick leaned across the stick shift and whispered near her ear.

"I love you, too." Robin wiped her hand down Patrick's stubbled cheek. They both glowed with newfound love. "Go be brilliant with your dad."

"Come over when you're done?" Patrick reached over Robin and opened the car door.

"Of course." Robin pressed another kiss on Patrick's lips before getting out of the car.

Patrick watched her go into the rehab center and then rested his hands on the steering wheel. How, he wondered, as the car idled, could he get through to his father this time after all the failures in the past? Maybe, he thought, he should have brought Robin along? She always seemed to know what to say to get through to his father. To him, for that matter. But that would be a cop out. This was something he had to do to make his mother proud, something he should have done years ago. He put the car in first gear and pulled away from the entrance of the _Port__ Charles Medical Rehabilitation Center_ and headed to the seedier side of town and Jake's. His father's new home.

* * *

"A bit early for drinking isn't it?" Noah turned his head and looked at the man who sat down on the stool next him.

"Isn't that my line?" Patrick said as he studied his father's haggard features and bloodshot eyes.

"Probably." Noah turned back to his drink.

"What happened, Dad?" Patrick asked quietly.

"Happened? Nothing really, just needed a drink too much to resist." Noah put the glass to his lips.

"And that's it. Everything you've done, we've been through, you throw away because it got too hard? What about the meetings? Your sponsor? What about checking into a detox center again?" Patrick licked his lips. "What about me?"

"Sorry I don't have a better story." Noah sighed and put the glass down between his hands on the bar and stared at the clear liquid. "You did fine without me for ten years." He shook his head. "You're better off without me. I'm nothing but a loser, Patrick. You just need to accept that and move on with your life."

Patrick frowned and rubbed a hand on the edge of the bar. He studied the wood grain for what to say. "I'm not better off without you, I never was." He turned his head and looked at Noah who was avoiding looking back at him.

"You're wrong about that. I've never done anything for you except leave you and take your liver and now I'm going to waste that one too." Noah put the glass to his lips again.

"This isn't what she would have wanted."

"Yeah, well, she doesn't get a say does she?" Noah said with rarely displayed bitterness at Mattie.

"She died, she didn't walk out."

"No, that's my job." Noah shook his head. "She'd be proud of you, Patrick. You don't need to waste your time rescuing me."

"Walk out of here with me now. We'll get you whatever help you need." Patrick put his hand on Noah's bicep.

Noah froze and his expression hardened. "I don't need help. I don't want help. I just want to be left alone. Go on with your life and forget about me."

"You keep saying that. How can I do that? You're my father!"

"You did it for the past ten years? It can't be that hard." Noah stood up abruptly, sending his stool to the floor. "You want to make your girlfriend proud then I'll tell her you said all the right things! But I'm not going to live my life according to the standards that you and everyone think I should live by! Just get out and leave me the hell alone!" Noah roared.

Patrick reared back, for the first time the anger he'd been suppressing rising to the surface. "Fine. You want to kill my liver too, be my guest." Patrick dug his wallet out of his pocket and pulled a bunch of bills out and threw them onto the bar. "Don't forget to let someone know whether you want to be cremated or buried. But you will never be next to my mother!"

Patrick spun on his heel and stormed out of Jake's.

Noah looked around at the two or three other die-hard drinkers scattered around the bar. Most of them too caught up in their own self-pitying haze to pay attention to the Drake family saga. Noah put his hands on his hips and looked down at the floor. "Forgive me, Mattie. Forgive me, Patrick." His voice was a low whisper that only he could hear.

* * *

Lorenzo Alcazar held up a finger at Anna Devane and walked away, his cell phone stuck to his ear. Anna smiled and pretended to be engrossed in the magazine she was reading. As soon as she heard the door snick shut she jumped up and walked to the other side of Alcazar's desk. She stuck a memory stick into the side of his laptop and began furiously typing, one ear keeping careful attention to any sounds of his return. Sixty seconds later she pulled the stick out and slid it back into her bra and sat herself down in the chair in front of the desk and crossed her legs. She gently tugged the copper colored skirt just a bit more up her thigh, moistened her lips and picked up the magazine again. This time she actually read the article on the new lipstick colors for fall.

A mere split second later Lorenzo Alcazar came walking through the door of his office again.

"Sorry about that. I had to take that call and I have to go to a meeting now." He leaned down and pressed a kiss to Anna's powdered cheek. Anna gave him a forgiving smile as he leaned against the desk in front of her. "Lunch was wonderful. Would it be too presumptuous to ask you for dinner tonight too?" He gave her a charming smile.

Anna found the man to be handsome, but knowing the black heart the beat underneath she felt not one ounce of attraction.

"As tempting as that is, I have other plans?"

"With your daughter?" he asked, his eyes flashing.

Whenever he mentioned Robin her skin crawl. She couldn't wait until she could throw the sleaze into prison.

"As a matter of fact, yes." Anna stood up and made herself available for his continental salutation.

"Then how about tomorrow night?" he murmured.

Just then Anna's cell phone rang. This time it was she he held a finger up as she took it out of her purse and looked at the caller id. "And I need to take this one. I'll call you tomorrow about dinner." She smiled and walked out, cognizant his calculating gaze following her.

"Hello, darling, how are you?" Anna said into the phone using a friendly tone until she was in the elevator. Then her tone changed dramatically. "Where?"

* * *

Anna walked down the alley, her spiked heels echoing on the uneven pavement. At least, she thought to herself, there wasn't trash and garbage piss all over the place. But that was about the only thing this part of town had to recommend to it. She had more than a passing thought to the custom of ladies wearing gloves. She reached the door she was directed to and stopped walking. She looked left, right and then up. Then she knocked on the door, two short raps, a long one, then two more short ones. Almost immediately the door opened and she slipped inside.

* * *

Robin handed the file to the nurse at the desk and checked her watch.

"Heading out?"

Robin turned to see who owned the unfamiliar voice. To her surprise it was Dr. Matt Rucker. "Hi, Matt. What are you doing here? I mean, are you here to see a patient?" She nervously wiped her hands on her pants.

"Yeah, I just got done. Are you leaving too?" Matt's blue eyes were friendly. "Maybe you have time for a cup of coffee?"

"Actually, I'm supposed to be meeting, Patrick. My boyfriend."

"Just coffee, I swear." Matt held his hands up and laughed.

Robin blushed and shifted nervously. "I didn't mean. I was just." She stopped talking and blew out a breath. "I guess I owe you an explanation for what happened last time. There's a café on the next block."

During the walk to the café, Matt and Robin made polite chit chat about work, their patients and the weather. Once there, Matt insisted on paying for their cappuccinos and they went and sat at a table outside in the seating area the shop shared with other eateries.

"I didn't mean to shove Patrick in your face back there," Robin said apologetically. She was hunched slightly over her drink.

"I never took you for that kind of person. I know you were being up front with me. It was quite a shock when I met your boyfriend so soon after our night together." Matt leaned back easily in his chair. "I'm no innocent, I wouldn't have said anything if you mentioned there was someone else in the picture."

"There wasn't, though. Not when you and I." Robin motioned between them, flushing slightly. "I would never have, done that if I was with someone. I can hardly believe that I did it at all."

"I'm not that bad looking am I?" Matt smiled and leaned forward when she flushed a deeper crimson. "You're cute when you're flustered." He took a sip of his drink.

"Are you flirting with me or teasing me?" Robin leaned back, suddenly feeling more comfortable with the cute doctor.

"Maybe both. How serious are things with this other doctor? You know he has quite a reputation."

"I know all about his reputation. Believe me. And it's serious."

Matt took another sip of his drink, watching her levelly over the cup. Then he put it down and said in a quiet voice, "If it doesn't work out, give me a call."

Robin blushed again and gave him a strained smile.

He laughed and then decided to let her off the hot seat and change the subject. "Who's this patient you were visiting?"

Neither of them noticed the shiny woman with the cheap bleach job sitting a couple of tables away smiling evilly over her ice cream sundae and ignoring her bickering children.


	22. Chapter 22

**Twenty-Two**

Patrick slammed the door to his room and stormed inside. Then stopped. He put his hands on his hips and glared at the floor, breathing heavy. Every word of his run in with his father was running through his mind in an endless loop. The smell of sweat and alcohol was still pungent in his nose. What was the worst, though, was the look and air of remorse that always got through his defenses and made him want to reach out and make it all better.

Patrick closed his eyes and swallowed. He remembered the first time he'd seen his father after his mother died. It was in a bar. Noah hadn't been home in days and the funeral was being held that afternoon. There had been an unbearable outpouring of sloppy, drunken grief and a litany of apologies and the same look in Noah's eyes as today – powerless drowning. For years Patrick had tried to make it better. He had dragged him out of bars. He had tried to make him proud with good grades to inspire him to go back to work. He had made feeble attempts at tough love. In the end all he could do was cut his father off and pretend he was already dead.

He had been doing okay with that – or was at least was numb to it – until Robin had managed to do what he had never been able to do, pull him out of the bar and back into his life. And together they had taken him the rest of the way. They had saved his life and forged a tentative family bond. Then something had happened to spur Noah to throw it all away and crawl back into an alcoholic haze. Patrick didn't know what it was. He had missed it, couldn't stop it. Maybe if he hadn't gone out of town he could have…he stopped his thoughts short. The Al-Anon jargon was starting to come back to him. "Easy Does It" or "Let Go and Let God." Patrick's face contorted. Somewhere in the last few months he had stopped bracing himself. Stopped waiting for the other shoe to drop. He had absorbed Robin's positive attitude. And now he was on the roller coaster again.

Patrick ran his hands over his face. His heart was still pounding.

He had once again seen the man in Noah that he had always admired and aspired to be. Now, that other man was back. The one that Patrick fought with every fiber of his being not to be. His tongue darted out and moistened his bottom lip. With a jerky motion he turned around and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind himself.

* * *

"A beer," Patrick told the Metrocourt bartender as his eyes skimmed over the multi-colored bottles that had such a stranglehold of his father. He was not him; he could have this beer, maybe even another one and then walk away. Tomorrow he would go back to work and he would continue to be a brilliant neurosurgeon. He couldn't control his father, but this he could control.

"Well, well, well. Saint Robin let you off the leash?"

"Hello, Carly." Patrick took another sip without bothering to look at the woman who had insinuated herself onto the stool next to him.

"You're in a mood, what happened? Get bored? Did you do something to disappoint her and she gave you a lecture? Decide you were ready for a real woman?"

"Shouldn't you be with your kids, Carly?"

"Oooooh. Did Saint Robin teach you that one?" Carly rolled her eyes and smoothed the shiny, blue material of her disco dress over her unbound breasts suggestively.

Patrick turned his head and looked at Carly. "Don't you ever get bored with your vendetta? What did you do for entertainment while Robin was in Paris?" Patrick shook his head and turned back to his beer.

"You know." Carly cocked her head. "There was something missing, I couldn't put my finger on it." Carly walked her finger over to Patrick and put it on his sleeve.

He looked down at it, then her and then took another sip of beer.

"You're no fun." Carly sighed dramatically and thrust her unbound chest out. "But I think I know something that will free you from the prison of tediousness."

"What's that? Marry a mobster?" Patrick smirked.

Carly's eyes flashed at Patrick's first outright insult. "Well, how about while you're here nursing your beer and bad mood, Saint Robin is meeting her other lover behind your back." She bared her teeth.

"You really should get your insults straight, Carly." Patrick laughed.

"Fine, don't believe me." Carly shrugged with feigned unconcern. "You're the one who doesn't see what's right in front of his eyes. When you come to your sense I won't say I told you so too many times." Her eyes darted to the side, her lips thinned and she pressed a sloppy kiss to Patrick's cheek. "Hello, Robin."

Robin watched the woman slink away with a disgusted look on her face. She shook her head and sat down on the stool next to Patrick. "How did things go with your dad?" she asked quietly.

"Dandy." Patrick held his bottle up to signal for another. "You want one?" he turned to look at her.

Robin frowned at the sight of his bloodshot eyes. "How many have you had?" she asked.

"I don't have a drinking problem if that's what you're wondering. That's my father's weakness. Or is it love that really screwed him up?" Patrick asked rhetorically.

"Patrick," Robin said gently and put her hand on his arm.

"There's nothing I can do to stop him." Patrick's voice was quiet and sad.

Robin leaned in closer and put her forehead against the side of his head. "No. There isn't, except be here when he's ready to help himself. How about we blow this popsicle stand and order room service?"

Patrick smiled sadly and signaled for the tab.

* * *

He put the key into the lock and walked into the room. "Shit!" He kicked the door shut behind him as he searched with his left hand for the light switch. The harsh light momentarily blinded him and he put his hand over his eyes and groaned. A rustle caught his ear and he dropped his hand. His eyes widened and Noah Drake jumped back and hit the door. "What the…Anna?" His mouth went dry at the sight of her sitting on his bed with her legs crossed under her thigh skimming dress. Noah looked around wildly and straightened up. "You scared the shit out of me, Anna, darling." His words were slurred.

"That's obvious." Anna stood up and walked up to him. She sniffed.

"What are you doing?" he chuckled and blinked innocently.

"You look like shit and you smell like a dirty bar." She looked into his eyes. "But you're not drunk. What the hell is going on Noah Drake?" Anna's clipped words echoed in the small, shabby room that looked just like what it was, a room above a bar.

"I don't know what you're talking about." Noah kept a bemused smile pasted on his face as he tried to walk around Anna. Despite her small stature, though, he couldn't seem to get past her. He sighed and rubbed his forehead.

"Don't make me hurt you."

"Sexy." Noah's lips quirked into a smile until he saw the very serious and threatening look on Anna's face. He sighed again. "Why don't you have seat." He looked around. All there was in the room was the bed, a beat up desk, matching dressed and a wooden chair. He pulled the chair over and offered her the bed again.

Anna gave him the evil eye and then sat back down on the bed, crossing her legs. Noah sat down across from her. His movements were smooth and easy. He put his hands on his thighs and leaned back against the seat casually.

"Pier nine."

Anna's eyes narrowed.

"It's Morgan's territory, but there's activity going on that even he doesn't know about. They're hiring extra hands for a shipment that's coming in next Thursday. A shipment expected by Lorenzo Alcazar."

Anna's eyes widened. "How do you know this? Why do you know this?" her question was tight with anger and fear.

"People talk in front of drunks." He shrugged, looking not only unconcerned, but rather smug.

Anna stood up and walked around his chair to stand behind him. "Let me get this straight. You're pretending to be drunk so that you can spy on Lorenzo Alcazar." She put her hand on his shoulder.

"In a nutshell."

She squeezed, harder and harder until Noah was leaning sideways in his chair grimacing.

Anna leaned down into his face. "Did Robert put you up to this?" she growled.

"Y…yes!" Noah groaned.

Anna let go. "I'm going to kill him!" She stalked around the room, fuming.

Noah stood up and rubbed his shoulder. "He didn't make me do anything. I wanted to help."

Anna spun around and faced him. "This isn't a game! These are real people who will not hesitate to kill you, they don't care that you're a Senator's son!"

"They won't hesitate to kill you either. Or your daughter or my son. Or your ex-husband, for that matter. From what I hear this arms dealer is already pissed that Robert helped the mother of his child escape his clutches."

"Robert is filling your head with nonsense."

"Don't lie to me, Anna." Noah grasped Anna's arms, startling her. "I've seen Alcazar at the hospital trying to get information on Skye Chandler from your daughter. I may just be a hapless surgeon and not a spy, but I'm going to do whatever I can to protect you and our children."

"And pay with your life?" Anna shook her head.

"I forfeited my life years ago. All this is just bonus."

"Don't talk like that, Noah!" Anna grasped his arm and looked up at him worriedly.

"Don't worry, I'm not out to get myself killed." He pulled her to him and wrapped his arms around her. "I've missed you so much." He scraped his fingers down her back.

"I missed you too." Anna tilted her head back and looked up at him.

"How long can you stay?" he asked huskily.

TBC


	23. Chapter 23

**_A/N: SMUT ALERT _**

**Twenty-Three **

She was worried about him, Robin thought as she closed the door to Patrick's room and watched him walk towards the couch and sit down. He was too quiet, too self-contained. The swagger and confidence that made him so unique, that made him Patrick Drake arrogant surgeon was missing. Part of it was that he was letting her in, but part of it was that he was just that busted apart. Her heart ached for him.

"How was Jeremy?"

God, how had she ever thought he was uncaring? "He's doing well. I'm happy with his neurological responses and his motor progress," Robin said as she walked over to the couch and settled at his urging on his lap. "Are you hungry?" Robin asked, stroking his cheek.

"Ravenous." He punctuated his words by tangling his hand in her hair and invading her mouth with his lips and tongue. He untangled his other hand from hers and put his arm under her legs. She gripped his shoulders as he stood up and carried her over to the bed, keeping their lips fused together. He wanted to drown himself in her. She would give him this respite from his troubled thoughts.

He placed her on the bed, separating their lips only so that he could slide her heels off her feet. Then he climbed up her body and settled between her knees and demanded another taste of her. His hands pulled at the fabric separating them, separating and shifting to remove the barrier between them. He made her body tremble and her throat hum. Her hands tugged at his clothes and when he got up to push his pants the rest of the way down his muscular legs he used the opportunity to grab the almost empty box of condoms from the bedside drawer. His eyes darkened as he looked down at her lying naked and wanton before him. He took a condom out and tossed the box onto the bed. His mouth widened in a wolfish smile as he licked his lips in anticipation. She held her arms up craving his weight back on top of her, holding her down, filling her.

He groaned when she grasped his hip and wrapped her hand around his pulsing arousal. He moved closer, balancing himself above her, losing himself in her urgent ministrations. The condom, still in its wrapper, crumpled in his hand as he held himself over her with that hand. His eyes dropped to half mast as she had her way with him. His hips bucked and jerked at her whim. His thighs quivered. He leaned down and slid his tongue in her mouth, miming the moves he wanted to make lower down with his body. He pressed the condom into her hand and wordlessly told her what he wanted. She grinned seductively as she tore the package open and slowly rolled it over his quaking erection.

He stared into her eyes and pressed his palms against Robin's and pulled them over her head. Then he filled her. Their eager moans filled the room as they arched into each other. Faster and faster. She tore her hands from his grip and clutched his back and pressed eagerly into his thrusts. "Come with me." He looked into her eyes for confirmation, their eyes locked they rushed to their mutual peak of pleasure and slowly came through the aftermath.

"I love you," he whispered in her ear.

"I love you." She smiled when he slid his arms around her and rolled them over to their sides and held on.

* * *

"I missed you, too." Anna tilted her head back and looked up at him.

"How long can you stay?" he asked huskily, tightening his hold on her body.

"I should go." Anna circled her hips against his arousal.

A growl of pleasure vibrated in Noah's chest. Watching her eyes for resistance he walked her backwards to the small bed that he'd been calling his own. He slid his knee between her legs and propped it on the bed. "How long can you stay?" he asked again as his hands slid down her back, over her thighs and under her dress. She arched into him and tightened her hold on his neck. He grinned and dipped his head to her neck and began to nibble.

Her arms straightened around his head as she ceded control of her body to him.

Continuing his touching and tasting he levered them down onto the bed. "In a rush?" he muttered as his hands flew over her body removing the barrier of her clothing. Faster than she could account for she was naked underneath him and being played by his fingers like an instrument.

"Noah," she gasped when his tongue took over between her legs. She fiddled with the bedclothes trying to find some purchase, but his ministrations were too expert, too arousing and she could not be grounded. She was pulsing her juices into him before she could catch her breath. Her body was still humming on simmer when his stubble rubbed at her stomach.

"I need to be inside you."

"I need you inside me."

He got up and rummaged in the overnight bag sitting on the floor with one hand, the other was unbuttoning his jeans. He tossed a crushed box of condoms onto the bed next her and finished undressing. "I hope what this lacks in finesse and ambience I make up for in pleasure," he whispered as he covered her with his naked body.

He took a condom out of the box and closed his eyes and groaned as Anna's small, strong hand closed around him. With a sense of urgency he tore the packet open and reached down to sheath himself. Together their hands made quick work of the job and she was spreading her legs open wider and he was driving inside her.

"You smell beautiful."

"You smell disgusting."

Noah laughed. "I've been aching for you." At his words she broke apart around him. Sweat dripped off his face as he continued to ride her through crest after crest of pleasure. "Noah," she urged, gave him permission.

Panting and sweaty they melded together.

"I want you to check into rehab. Hide out until this is over," she pleaded quietly.

"No." Noah got up and sat down on the edge of the bed.

Anna sat up, pulling a sheet over her nudity. "I can't worry about you and do…"

"Then don't. I don't need or want you to worry about me. Robert and I have everything covered." They stared at each other, testing.

"Your son is devastated thinking you've gone back to drinking."

Noah looked away, his face stony. "I know he may never forgive me for lying to him and even if he does he may never trust me again." He looked back at Anna. "If it keeps everyone safe it'll be worth it."

"You're determined to do this." Anna shook her head.

She sounded shaken so he reached out and took her into his arms. "Yes." He pressed a kiss to her hair.

"I need for you to be careful."

"Same goes."

Ten minutes later Anna was walking back into the dark alley. The click of her heels echoed behind her as she slipped behind another building and took a route that would drop her out into the street blocks away from the Jake's.

She never saw Lorenzo Alcazar walking out of the shadows behind her with a gun in his gloved fist. He stood still as the sounds of her departure faded away. Then he turned and looked up at a lighted window in the building next to him. After a few minutes he put the gun into the pocket of his black trench coat and turned and walked out of the alley.

TBC


	24. Chapter 24

**Twenty-Four**

"He's having you followed."

"I know that." Anna's arms were crossed and she was refusing to look at Robert Scorpio. If she looked at him, she was going to…

"He followed you to Jake's."

Anna spun around and turned to look at her ex-partner, a look of horror on her face.

"You've put Noah Drake in danger."

"You're the one who filled his head on what a hero he could be." Anna jabbed her finger into Robert's chest.

Robert grabbed her finger. She pulled it out of his grasp. "You put him in danger by starting an affair with him when you're here for a mission. You put him in danger by visiting him in his new abode. All he was doing was gathering information that he was going to pass on to me and I was…"

"You were what?" Anna's eyes narrowed. "Going to hold on to it? Use it for Skye's benefit? Did you tell Noah you were going to pass it along to me?"

"I was going to pass it along to you if I felt that it was relevant information or you weren't going to get sloppy about it. You always get sloppy when you're blinded by sex, Anna."

"That's bullshit!" Anna glared at Robert. "You just always have to win at all costs, even when we're on the same side. You're a lousy spy, Robert."

"You're just pissed because however lousy you want to pretend you think I am I've still gotten one over on you. And so did Lorenzo Alcazar." Robert crossed his arms.

"You're getting in my way, Robert," Anna said warningly.

"Then tell me what you're up to."

"You know I can't do that."

"What I know is that you let Alcazar follow you tonight to Jake's. What I know is that this guy is eying our daughter and her mother. What I know is that you were sent out here without backup. What I know is that you need my help."

"He's eying Robin because you helped his pregnant girlfriend disappear. A woman who is related to two very wealthy families and has some very wealthy friends who could have helped her. You got involved to get at me."

"I got involved to protect my daughter and her mother. I got involved because you came here lying about why you're here while casting stones about my choices involving our daughter." Robert leaned down into her face. "We work better together than apart. I know what he's up to already, what I don't know is what you're orders are. Stop him or help him?"

* * *

"Good afternoon, Dr. Drake."

Patrick handed a file off to a nurse and leaned against the counter of the nurse's station and leaned over the cheery greeter. "Good afternoon, Dr. Scorpio. At least I think that's Dr. Scorpio." Patrick looked around and then leaned in closer. "I hardly recognize you with clothes on."

Robin's eyes widened and she began to blush. She grabbed his arm and pulled him over towards the waiting room. "You can't say things like that to me here!" She crossed her arms defensively.

"I think we proved that I can." Patrick bit his bottom lip and grinned unabashedly.

Robin groaned and opened her mouth to retort, before she could speak, however they were interrupted.

"Robin? Dr. Drake?"

"Matt!" Robin looked around Patrick to see the Mercy doctor standing with a lab coat and a file in his hand. "What are you doing here?" Robin knew her voice was high and awkward. She cleared her throat, pretending it was just a frog.

"I'm consulting on D.A. Davis' case," he said somberly. "I saw you over here and I was wondering if you had time for coffee before I head back to Mercy." He looked at both doctors.

"Patrick?" Robin asked, clearing her throat.

"I have a consult in five minutes. You go have fun. Just not too much," he whispered the last part when he pressed a kiss to her cheek before walking back over to the nurse's station to retrieve the file for his next appointment completely unaware of the ironic impact of his words. He opened the file and glanced back over to where Robin and that Dr. Matt Rucker were still chatting. It looked to him like Robin was trying get out of coffee. Maybe he should go and rescue her?

"Well, that's an unexpected sight."

Patrick stifled a groan as Carly insinuated herself into his space. "I have to be somewhere else," he said stiffly.

"And leave your girlfriend alone with him? Wow." Carly attempted a surprised look.

"He's harmless, Carly. Unlike you."

Carly smiled as if she had been complimented. "It's sweet that you trust your girlfriend with him." Carly picked her purse up from the counter and turned away.

"Wait." Patrick shifted uncomfortably and looked back at Robin and the other doctor who were still talking.

Carly turned back around, a victorious smile on her face.

"Stop messing around in mine and Robin's relationship."

"I'm just trying to live up to St. Wobin's standards. You know how she likes to tell her friends things that are none of her business regardless of who it hurts? Like about paternity tests or sexual affairs." She grinned evilly. "If you decide you need company tonight I'll be at Jake's. Bye bye." She waved at Patrick, shot a triumphant smirk at Robin who was watching them from across the lobby and then sauntered out enjoying every nerve she'd manage to leave exposed and twitching behind her.

Patrick's gut roiled at the thought of Jake's and his father and at the look on Robin's face which stopped him from immediately dismissing Carly's words as lying poison.

"Dr. Drake, you're three o'clock is waiting," a nurse informed him.

Out of time, Patrick looked at Robin one last time and walked away.

Robin's eyes narrowed as she wondered what trouble Carly was brewing up.

* * *

"There you are. I've been looking for you everywhere," Robin said when she walked into the doctor's lounge and found Patrick changing out of his scrubs.

"Here I am," Patrick said stiffly, not turning around.

Robin frowned. Either Carly had been messing with his head or it was about Noah. Or both. She wouldn't put it past the woman to use Noah to get what she wanted from Patrick, namely revenge on Robin for spoiling her latest baby paternity lie.

"Did you enjoy your coffee with Rucker?"

Robin stiffened and her heart began to pound. "I didn't go to coffee with Matt." She slid her hands into the pockets of her lab coat.

"Why not?" Patrick turned around, he was bare-chested, his dark brown button down shirt still in his hands.

"I didn't have time to stop for coffee." Robin looked him in the eyes.

"Sure." Patrick turned away and put his shirt on.

"Did I do something to upset you?"

Patrick was just grabbing his watch to put it back on and paused. He licked his lips and swallowed. Then he let out a breath. He turned around and shook his head. "No. You didn't do anything. Carly's been saying this stuff and I guess I've just been in the mood to let them get to me." He smiled apologetically.

"Saying stuff about your father?" Robin asked hesitantly.

"In a round about way." Patrick fastened his watch on his wrist. "Mostly it was stuff about you."

"Nothing new about that." Robin rolled her eyes. "What in particular this time?"

Patrick straightened the cuffs on his shirt and shrugged his shoulders. "She's been making insinuations that you're sleeping with someone else. With that Rucker guy, as a matter of fact." Patrick turned back around to close his locker so he missed Robin's shocked reaction.

Robin's hands, still in her pockets, clenched into fists and she looked down at the ground.

"Do you think I can convince you to cook tonight?" Patrick turned back around and the smile slipped from his face when he saw Robin's posture. "Oh no, you're not going to let Carly ruin our evening."

Robin looked up, her dark eyes serious, guilt written all over her face.

"Robin, you'd better say something now, because I'm thinking things right now that don't even make any sense," Patrick bit out.

"We should talk, Patrick. But not here."

"I think right here right now is necessary." He put his hands on his hips. "What the hell is going on with you and that Rucker guy?"

"There's nothing going on. There never really was…"

"Never really was?" Patrick's voice rose on the last word.

Robin looked around and then back at Patrick. "I don't know how Carly found out, but I did sleep with Matt. It was one time when you and I weren't even involved. We weren't even no-strings at the time." Robin spoke quickly and defensively. Her stomach sinking as Patrick just looked at her like he didn't know her. "Patrick, say something."

"I need to go." He walked out of the doctor's lounge, ignoring her pleas to stop.

Robin put her hands on her hips and turned around, her mouth and eyes wide with shock.

TBC


	25. Chapter 25

**Twenty-Five **

"I tried calling you all night," Robin said quietly.

"I was busy." Patrick kept his eyes on the chart he was studying. They were standing at the nurse's station. It was almost twenty-four hours since the revelation of Robin's one night stand with Dr. Matt Rucker from Mercy Hospital and not a word had passed between them since.

"We need to talk."

"We don't _need_ to do anything." Patrick picked up his chart and backed up from the counter to walk away.

"We…what happened to your hand?" Robin reached out and touched his left hand which had a graze and swollen knuckles.

Patrick pulled out of her grasp and gave her a disdainful look. "I don't need your help, doctor. I have to go." He spun around and stormed off.

Robin sighed and rubbed her head. "Your files, Dr. Scorpio." Nurse Epiphany Johnson pushed a pile across the counter towards Robin.

"Thank you." Robin looked down at the files and the back up at Epiphany. "Do you know what happened to his hand?"

"Maybe he hurt it fighting the thing that crawled up his butt and died. I told you if you hurt him I'd wring your neck." Epiphany raised her eyebrows at Robin and pointed at her with her pen.

Robin frowned angrily at Epiphany. "I didn't do anything wrong. He's the one acting like an immature jackass!" Robin grabbed her files and made to walk away.

"Well, then it's about time you start acting pissed off instead of apologetic, don't you think?" Epiphany said rhetorically and then turned away.

Robin frowned again. Then, leaving the files at the desk, she turned and stormed off in the direction Patrick had gone.

* * *

"No. I don't understand," Anna Devane said in a clipped tone into her cell phone. She was standing outdoors in an alley near Kelly's. The buildings cast a shadow over her despite the fact that it was early afternoon. "It wasn't supposed to go down like this. This wasn't what I was told." She paced back and forth.

"No! I have the information you asked for." She cursed under her breath. "No. It has to end now. My family is in danger now."

She closed her eyes and paced again.

"You can't change the parameters now. I told you when I went…" Anna stopped pacing. "No. I won't!"

She listened to the voice on the phone. "If you won't I'll do it my way. Fine. I understand. But you have to also." She clicked off the phone and dropped her arm. She waited a beat and then picked it up again. She pressed a button. "Robert, as much as I hate to say this, I need your help."

* * *

"What the hell is your problem?" Robin demanded as soon as she stormed into Patrick's office, not even waiting for the door to slam behind her.

"My problem?" Patrick slammed the file he hadn't really been reading closed and stood up behind his desk.

"I know you're a novice at this so let me give you a tip, people in relationshiops talk about things not storm away like a child!" Robin put her hands on her hips. "And punch things."

"You're giving me relationship advice, that's rich. Where does not sleeping with someone else fit into your set of rules and standards?" Patrick put his hands on his hips and glared at her.

"I didn't sleep with someone else." Robin sighed and dropped her hostile stance. "Will you just let me explain?"

Patrick just stared at her stonily.

"We, you and I, were not even together at the time. I don't' understand why you're so angry with me." Robin held her palms up to illustrate her lack of understanding.

Patrick scowled and flicked at something on his desk, angrily. Truthfully, he wasn't quite sure what he was so angry about it all either. He just knew that he was and he didn't like it.

"We weren't even sleeping together with no-strings at the time. There was nothing between us at all. Maybe I should have told you, but I didn't think you'd care and…"

"And what?" Patrick really looked at her for the first time.

"And." Robin turned around and paced a couple of times. "And it didn't seem like it would matter to you and I would just be over-sharing as you always accuse me of doing. Then you told me that you hadn't been with anyone else and it felt small of me to undermine that by telling you that I had." She looked at him with tears in her eyes. "I was never proud of what happened. I only did it because I was trying to get you out of my system. It didn't work," she confessed quietly.

Patrick's expression softened and he looked down at his hands. He clenched and unclenched his left hand, thinking of the surgery he had to put off that day because of the injury. "This is why I never wanted to be in a relationship," he said quietly.

"What do you mean _this_?" Robin walked up to his desk and looked up at him curiously.

"This." He waved between them. "All these expectations and feelings. It's painful and annoying. It has you hitting people you barely know or drowning yourself in alcohol and throwing your life away."

"Patrick," Robin said softly, her eyes filled with sympathy.

"No. No. I didn't want these emotional bonds. You're right, you were free to sleep with whoever you wanted at the time and it shouldn't bother me. But it does. It makes me furious to think of you with someone else. Whether we were together or not."

"We can work this out," Robin said thickly.

"I can't do this. I won't do this." Patrick's voice was firm with conviction. "I'm sorry. I never should have led you on." He walked around the desk and past Robin.

She reached out and grabbed his arm. He turned his head and looked at her. His face was blank and his eyes dark with hurt and determination. Her breath hitched and she let go. He walked out.

* * *

"Apparently, we missed all the fun last night at the Sports Club over on the east side," Dr. Kelly Lee, Robin's roommate, announced as soon as she walked into the nurse's station.

Robin shrugged and didn't look up from her chart.

"What did we miss, Kelly, you ask? Well, while we were home drowning your sorrows over Dr. Dickhead he was at the Sports Club punching out Dr. Matt Rucker for, and I quote, 'sleeping with his girlfriend' end quote."

"You air quote in my nurse's station again and I'll knock you into next week," Epiphany informed the doctor in a no nonsense tone.

The disclosure and the banter did nothing to elicit a response from Robin.

"Didn't you hear me? Patrick got all jealous and defended your honor." Kelly leaned in closer

"What you didn't hear is that he broke up with her this afternoon," Epiphany informed her when Robin seemed no closer to saying anything at all.

"He did what!" Kelly exclaimed loudly.

"Mmmmm hmmmm," Epiphany confirmed.

"That idiot!" Kelly put her hands on her hips. "Wait until I get a hold of him!"

"Get a hold of whom?" Emily Quatermaine asked as she walked into the nurse's station. After breaking up with Sonny Corinthos, the young med student had been attending all of her classes and her shifts at the hospital. Epiphany was keeping her on a short lease though.

"Patrick broke up with Robin!" Kelly announced loudly.

"Everyone does not need to know that," Robin said dejectedly.

"Everyone is going to know because you two never keep your personal life out of the hospital," Epiphany pointed out matter-of-factly.

"Don't worry about that right now. What we need to worry about is Dr. Hypocrite," Kelly said.

"Kelly, he's going through a hard time right now. Leave him alone," Robin defended.

"He doesn't know from hard time until we get through with him," Kelly declared.

"Please, I know you mean well, but I really don't want anyone to do anything on my behalf. Nurse Johnson, I'll be in my lab if anyone needs me." Robin held her files to her chest and walked away.

"She looks so sad." Emily sighed and sniffled.

"I'm going to find Lainey. This is bullshit!" Kelly stormed off.

Epiphany smiled in satisfaction. Emily looked confused.

* * *

Patrick Drake walked into Jake's. He walked up to the bar. "Coleman. Have you seen my father?"

"He left a couple of hours ago. But he still has a big tab if you're interested in seeing to that?" Coleman smiled sleazily.

Patrick whipped out his wallet and slammed it down on the bar. He looked at it a minute. Then he picked it back up and tore out a few bills and put them down on the bar. "Where did he go, Coleman?" He pulled the bills back before Coleman could grab them, letting him know he had to earn the money first.

"Now, now. My best friend wouldn't be pleased to know that you're trying to charge my other friend money for information would he?" Carly rocked her head back and forth and gave what she thought of as a seductive look before grabbing the money out of Patrick's hand and sliding it into the strap of her orange and red zebra-striped dress. "Tell him what he wants to know."

"He said he'd be back. He was just meeting a man about a job. That's all I know. Do you want a beer, man?" Coleman held his hands up in the air.

"No thanks." Patrick turned to look at Carly, his eyes sweeping over her in an automatic fashion. "That hard up for cash?" He smirked.

"Come and get it? Or better yet, how about a game of pool. Although I think we can come up with stakes a lot more interesting than your wad of cash." She blinked and grinned at him.

"I have to get back to work." Patrick turned and started walking out.

"My, Saint Wobin has you well trained." Carly jerked her head back and forth again and stuck her hand on her hip.

Patrick spun around angrily and walked up to the woman. "Stay the hell away from me and stay the hell away from Robin. And while you're at it, stay the hell away from my father." He whipped the money out of her dress before she could react and walked back up to the bar and slammed the cash down on it. "Call me if my father needs me."

He turned, gave Carly one last glance and then walked out.

"Looks like you've lost a playmate, toots." Coleman slid the cash into the pocket his jeans.

"Get me a drink and shut up." Carly walked over to the pool table.

TBC


	26. Chapter 26

**Twenty-Six**

"I'm glad you called, darling." Anna stood up from her table at Kelly's and pressed a kiss to her daughter's cheek. "How are things with Patrick?"

"Is everything with you about Patrick?" Robin rolled her eyes as she sat down across the table and put her purse down on a spare chair. "Isn't it enough that I, your daughter, wanted to see you?"

Anna raised an eyebrow and leaned forward across the table. "What happened with Patrick?" In truth, she already knew, but she knew Robin wouldn't appreciate how she knew that days ago Patrick had broken things off and had been doing his best to avoid her and revert back to the uncaring man who had no family or friends. And she definitely could not know how the news was affecting Noah who was just as stubbornly insisting his son needed to be safe more than he needed his father.

Robin stopped resisting. She put her elbow on the table and rested her head on it, avoiding her mother's eyes she confessed, "He broke up with me."

"What!" Anna's voice filled the restaurant. "Why?" she said more quietly, trying to not overplay her hand.

"He found out about that guy I slept with." Robin sighed and toyed with the fork on the table. "He freaked out and broke up with me."

"That was back when he was still running in the other direction from commitment; he has no right to be mad about that."

"I think it has more to do with Noah and the fact that I didn't tell him." Robin swallowed. "He told me he loved me when we were away. And then like Noah I violated his trust."

"I'm going to kill him," Anna said, not specifying which Drake she was speaking of.

"Please leave him alone, mom. If and when he's ready to work things out I want it to be on his own terms and not because my well-intentioned, but interfering and scary mother forced him to." Robin looked at her meaningfully.

"Fine. I'll stay away from Patrick. What would you like to have for lunch? Is the chili still good?" Anna smiled innocently and took a sip of her iced tea. "You know, I have a phone call to make. I'll be right back." She said she's stay away from Patrick, but she definitely didn't promise that Robert would, and since it was all his fault enduring Robin and Patrick's wrath was the least he could do.

* * *

"Ah, Dr. Drake, just the man I was looking for."

"I'm actually busy, Mr. Scorpio." Patrick's eyes darted around evasively. He was wearing blue scrubs and he rested his empty hands on his hips.

"Well, it's a good thing I checked with that lovely nurse at the station and she told me that you had just finished surgery and post-op and were due for a break." Robert smiled charmingly at Nurse Epiphany Johnson standing at the counter watching them.

"If this is about Robin, I really don't think that I should talk to you about…"

"About my daughter's sex life? I understand completely that you are having a jealous fit imagining the woman you love with another man, even if it occurred while you." Robert jabbed a finger in Patrick's chest. "Were too stupid and cowardly to commit to her yourself." Robert's smile had more than a hint of threat. "But I'm actually here to talk about you. Let me buy you a cup of amazingly bad hospital coffee, won't you?"

* * *

"What is it you wanted to talk about, Mr. Scorpio?" Patrick asked and then took a sip of coffee. They were sitting across from each other at a small, round cafeteria table.

"Like I said before, I can understand how it feels to imagine the woman you love with another man. It makes you crazy. I bet you imagined you'd never feel that way given your own reputation." Robert put a hand up when Patrick started to interrupt. "I can see why you'd maybe not handle that so well. But I think you're doing yourself a disservice, young Drake. Robin is an amazing woman and you have the fortune of having her love you. Opportunities like that don't come around often. And I'm not just saying that because I'm her father. I've had the honor of being loved by her mother. You don't want to throw that away like I have."

"Mr. Scorpio…"

"Robert."

"Robert." Patrick dipped his head for a moment. "I'm just not cut out for this relationship stuff. I'm selfish and…."

"That's a nice line, but it's a load of crap. It's a lot to take in, falling in love, being jealous and seeing your father fall off the wagon again. You might wonder if it's worth the effort, but since you strike me as the kind of man who succeeds at whatever he puts his mind to and I'm sure a relationship with my daughter would be challenge enough to keep your interest, you know that you could make her happy. The question is whether you choose to be a coward and live with regret for the rest of your life or whether you step up and be a man." Robert stood up. "You know, this coffee is just as horrible as I remember. I thought maybe my feelings about it would change after all these years. Funny, that." He walked off leaving Patrick sitting and staring into his dark brew.

* * *

"Well, well, well, if it isn't Dr. Hypocrite," Dr. Kelly Lee said dramatically as Patrick Drake walked up to the nurse's station. He glared at Robin's roommate and slammed his clipboard down on the desk. "Look Epiphany, it's the pig that would nail anything that moves…"

"I don't think Dr. Scorpio would appreciate having her personal business aired with such detail in the hospital." Epiphany cut off the pretty doctor.

"Thank you." Patrick smiled at Epiphany.

"That's not to say she isn't right about the hypocrite part." Epiphany pointed at the male doctor, wiping the smug grin off her face. Kelly stuck her tongue out at him from behind Epiphany's back. Patrick stuck his back at her.

"I wasn't told we were moving the day care to the tenth floor," Dr. Lainey Winters commented as she walked up to them.

"Months ago," Epiphany said laconically, casting glares at Kelly and Patrick who just grinned at her.

"Well, behave yourself because Robin is on her way up from the lab to meet us for dinner," Lainey said as she put a file into an empty slot on the wall.

Patrick stiffened and turned to slink away, but go no more than three steps when the elevator doors opened and Robin was standing there. They both stopped short at the sight of the other. The doors started to close as the two doctors stared at each other. Patrick leapt forward and put his hand between the doors to stop them from closing.

"Aren't you getting out?" he asked, swallowing over the lump in his throat. His eyes darkening with longing as he looked at her.

"Yeah. And you're getting on?" she asked, shifting uncomfortably under the intensity of his gaze.

"No. I, uh, I forgot something." He watched her intently as she passed closely by him out of the elevator. He removed his hand from the door and turned to watch her, oblivious to the doors closing behind him.

"Any messages for me, Epiphany?" Robin asked, all the while conscious of Patrick's eyes on her.

"None."

Robin thanked the nurse and turned to her roommates. "Where are we going for dinner?" she asked.

"Maybe Dr. Dickhead can recommend someplace? Somewhere maybe where he's taken one of the hundreds of women he slept with?" Kelly gave Patrick a fake grin over Robin's head. "Or did I underestimate?"

"Kelly," Robin said quietly, but firmly.

"No, it's all right. Clearly, Dr. Lee has a lot that she wants to get off her chest." Patrick stepped forward to stand next to Robin at the counter and crossed his arms. "About things that are none of her business."

"Robin is my friend and my roommate and you hurt her that makes it my business."

"Kelly, Patrick, please," Lainey tried to interrupt and was ignored.

"Maybe if you had a love life of you wouldn't need to pass judgment on mine."

Epiphany just shook her head and answered the ringing phone.

"I might have more of a love life of my own if you men weren't such hypocrites!" Kelly leaned forward, her eyes flashing.

"We're not hypocrites, you just scare men away! The night I took you to the Haunted Star…" Patrick leaned forward over the counter closer to her as he yelled. He was spoiling for a fight and Kelly was giving him the perfect excuse.

"Hey! Hey!" Epiphany held her hand over the phone and broke up the brawl. "This is a hospital!"

Patrick and Kelly turned their head in surprise. They had both forgotten where they were.

"Dr. Scorpio, it's for you."

Robin licked her lips and took the phone, assiduously avoiding Patrick who was looking over at her, his face flushed.

Robin greeted the caller and then as she listened began to get pale. Patrick frowned and licked her lips and leaned in. Her eyes darted up to meet his. "All right, we'll be waiting." Robin hung up the phone.

"What happened?" Patrick asked worriedly.

She looked up at him, tears shimmering in her eyes. "That was the rehab center. Jeremy is being rushed to the hospital. He's unconscious." Robin grasped the sleeve of Patrick's lab coat. "He might need surgery, will you do it?"

"Of course." Patrick nodded. "Let's get down to the E.R. Epiphany, which O.R. is free?"

"Four."

"Have a team assembled. Let's go." Patrick put his hand on Robin's back and gently guided her towards the stairs and down to the E.R.

Kelly frowned and looked at Lainey. "Let them work it out themselves, Kel. When the chips are down, they're a team." Lainey told her.

* * *

The long beep pierced the air of operating room.

Dr. Patrick Drake kept barking orders. Increasing various drugs. Charging the paddles. All while continuing his operation on the previously undetected aneurysm that had burst.

Robin shook her head and looked at Epiphany who was watching her with sympathetic eyes. They all knew the surgery was a long-shot from the beginning, but Patrick had insisted on trying anyway. Now, he was refusing to give, needing to save this boy for the sake of the woman he loved.

"You need to call it, Dr. Drake." Epiphany put her hand over Patrick's. It took a moment for him to register the interference and to look at the nurse. Then he looked at Robin who was standing at Jeremy's feet. Above her mask her eyes were wet and pained. "Call it," she whispered.

Patrick pulled his hands back and looked up at the clock above Robin's head.

"Time of death ten forty-five p.m."

The vitals monitor was turned off. Robin turned and slipped out of the room before Patrick could say anything to her.

TBC


	27. Chapter 27

**Twenty-Seven **

She had already spoken to the Gilmartens by the time he had gotten out of the O.R. and had left the hospital. She wasn't answering her apartment phone, her pager or her cell phone. She wasn't at her apartment or on the docks. He had even done the unthinkable and called her parents, who hadn't seen her either. Patrick was at his wit's end when he finally got off the elevator on the floor of his room at the Metrocourt. His shoulders were drooping with fatigue and his chest ached with tension. It was an uncharacteristic pose, but one he had gotten used to over the past few days. He dug his key out of his jeans and headed towards his room.

"Hey."

He halted and looked up. He hadn't seen the small bundle sitting in front of his door.

"God, Robin. I've been looking for you everywhere," he said as she stood up.

He walked up to her, licked his lips and just looked at her.

"Can I come inside for a minute?" she asked quietly.

"Yeah, of course." He nodded dumbly and stuck his key into the lock and unlocked the door. Now that he had found her he wasn't sure what to say. He pushed the door open and guided her inside and closed it behind him. He stopped and watched her walk over to the couch. "Can I get you a drink? Wine? Water?"

"No, I'm fine." She turned to face him, her purse dangling awkwardly in her hands. "I just came here to thank you. I should have at the hospital, but I just had to…leave." She shrugged.

"Thank me for what?" Patrick said bitterly. "Failing you?"

Robin frowned. "You didn't fail me. You did everything you could. We both knew it was hopeless when you went in. If anyone failed it was me." She turned away, mangling the strap of her purse in her fists.

Patrick stepped forward. "You didn't fail, Robin." He reached out a hand to put on her shoulder, but let it drop before he touched her, not knowing if it would be welcome.

"You should have operated right away, after the accident, maybe then you could have caught this before it was too late." Her voice broke. "You're right, my drug protocols endanger people." Her voice ended on a sob.

Patrick swallowed and licked his lips. He nodded abruptly and then moved forward and grabbed Robin by the shoulders and turned her around to face him. His heart panged when he saw the tears on her cheeks, but he didn't hesitate. "I was wrong and I haven't believed that for a long time. I've seen you save lives. I've seen your work cause miracles."

"Some miracle today."

"What happened today no one could have prevented, you know that. I know you know that." He shook her shoulders. "I saw the scans all the way through and so did you. This did not show up and it probably was something that happened spontaneously today and it might have had nothing to do with the accident!"

Robin closed her eyes and shook her head.

"I know you're looking for some reason, someone to blame, but we both know that bad things happen to good people and a lot of the time there is nothing we can do about it," he said gently, his hand cupping her face. "But people like us, they hang in there for the times we can do something. I'm not going to let you give up."

Robin bit her lip and stared into his eyes, her tears running faster now.

"If anyone failed you it was me."

"No." Robin shook her head.

"Not today, not in surgery. Before." Patrick swallowed. "About what happened before we were together." He felt Robin stiffen and he wrapped his arms around her. "I was wrong to run out on you, to get angry about something that happened when we weren't together."

"I should have told you, not let you find out that way." Robin sighed. "I was a coward."

"It wasn't my business." He kept one arm wrapped around her and put the other one on her cheek and wiped at her tears with his thumb. "I told you I loved you and then I ran out at the first problem. It was rude and it was immature. Can you forgive me?"

"Yes. Can you forgive me?"

"Nothing to forgive." Patrick pressed a kiss to her hair. "I think you should call your parents and your roommates and let them know you're all right."

Robin pulled back and looked up at him in wonder. "You really were looking for me everywhere. You called my parents?"

He nodded. "I was worried about you." He sat down and pulled her onto his lap. "You once told me that Jeremy reminded you of Stone. Even if you didn't want to see me, I didn't think you should be alone tonight." He searched her face. "Will you stay with me?"

"Always." Robin wrapped her arms around Patrick's neck.

* * *

It was quiet a revelation to do and be all the things he was when he was drunk and be sober. It was downright creepy at times talking with other drunks, listening to the bragging and the nonsensical stories that he knew sounded like pure genius when he himself was inebriated. Now, the epiphanies were few and far between in this half-world he had been living.

But not completely non-existent he acknowledged as he helped tie the boat up on the dock and prepare it for loading. Not unloading as he had previously believed.

It was a job that he was completely unqualified to do and he imagined there was a union for this kind of thing, but most of his compatriots were similarly down-on-their-luck cases looking for a quick buck in exchange for a zipped lip.

Noah stood up and wiped his long-sleeved t-shirt clad arm across his sweaty forehead. His hair, borderline unruly before his seeming descent to rock bottom, was sticking to his forehead and his neck and making him itch.

"You, over here!" Noah looked up to see the foreman or whatever the heck he was called pointing at him. Damn, he had planned to slip away for some water and a furtive call to Robert.

"What's a guy gotta do to get a drink around here?" he mumbled petulantly, not quite under his breath as he approached the guy known only as Pedro.

"The boss wants to see you inside."

"What? Am I getting a promotion?" Noah smirked.

Pedro was not amused, merely pointed towards the office and dismissed Noah from his mind.

A bad feeling came over Noah as he approached the pier building.

* * *

"This was a good idea," Robin said.

"I have those from time to time." Patrick grinned down at Robin over his ice cream cone, laughing when Robin swung their entwined hands and skipped at few steps, dragging Patrick after her. Feeling that things were getting too emotional and confirming that Robin hadn't had dinner yet, Patrick had insisted that they head down to the amusement park at the pier and have "fresh" corn dogs, soda and ice cream for dessert. They got in just before it closed and were now walking along the docks with their soft serve. Vanilla for him. Chocolate and vanilla swirl with rainbow sprinkles for her.

"I wish we had tomorrow off." Robin rolled her shoulders and took a lick of her melting ice cream.

"You're going to lose all of that." Patrick picked her hand up and took a bite out of her ice cream.

"Hey!" Robin pulled back, laughing. "That's not going to help, you pig!"

"This will." He lifted her hand again and began to lick at the ice cream that was dripping onto her hand.

"You goof! Now yours is melting." She pulled at his hand and brought it to her mouth. Unlike him, though, her licks were slower, longer, more seductive. Patrick groaned and pulled her close with his other hand.

"We should have eaten these naked," he growled and captured her lips. "I missed you," he murmured in between kisses.

"Me too," Robin said breathlessly. Their ice cream fell forgotten to the wood of the dock.

* * *

"Where the hell is he?" Anna said into Noah's empty room. Robert stood just behind her looking irritated.

"I told you, he's working on Pier 9."

Anna spun around. "And I told you that he's not there." Anna pulled her phone out and pressed a button. "Any sign? Dammit. Keep looking." She cut the connection. "Damn you, Robert!"

"His check in is only half an hour late, Anna. Relax." Despite his words, Robert didn't look relaxed himself. Like Anna, he had people watching Noah at the Pier and he knew that Noah hadn't been seen since he disappeared into the warehouse.

"Do you have people watching our kids?" Anna demanded sharply.

"Of course!" Robert scowled at her. "If you had just told me what the hell was going on sooner instead of that bullshit cover story I could have…"

"Spare me, Robert. Working on the Haunted Star my ass," Anna scoffed. "This has to end tonight."

"Except that your agency wants to let the shipment go through so they can get higher up the food chain." Robert shook his head, muttering to himself about greedy idiots.

"And your agency?"

"I'm a free agent, darling. I keep telling you that." Robert held his hands out and smiled charmingly. Then his façade of amusement dropped away. "We can't let that ship out of here. Alcazar knows too much."

"What arrangements have you made?"

Robert's lips thinned in disgust. "I tipped off Corinthos' organization. Or Morgan's. Whoever the hell is running the show. Might as well let the criminal element be useful for once."

Anna thought for a moment. "We need to find Noah. And get Patrick and Robin out of the way."

Robert nodded and made a phone call of his own. He cursed. "Get them now!" He clicked his phone off. "They're together now on the dock."

"Too damn close," Anna exclaimed and headed out of the room, Robert on her heels.

* * *

Robin and Patrick were getting into their kiss, neither heard the footsteps coming towards them. The hands that grabbed at both of them and pulled them apart took them by surprise.

Robin slipped on the melted ice cream as she was dragged away from Patrick. She struggled against the arms entrapping her. "Patrick!" she yelled and was promptly silenced by a hand on her mouth. She watched in mute horror as Patrick was dragged, struggling, away from her.

TBC


	28. Chapter 28

**Twenty-eight **

_Robin and Patrick were getting into their kiss, neither heard the footsteps coming towards them. The hands that grabbed at both of them and pulled them apart took them by surprise. _

_Robin slipped on the melted ice cream as she was dragged away from Patrick. She struggled against the arms entrapping her. "Patrick!" she yelled and was promptly silenced by a hand on her mouth. She watched in mute horror as Patrick was dragged, struggling, away from her. _

She had to get away. She had to get to Patrick.

She let her body go limp. Now, that panic was past she remembered the training that had been instilled in her since she was a little girl. She felt the person holding her stumble. Taking advantage, Robin kept her body limp and planted her foot on the ground and twisted her ankle perpendicular to her body. It was a risky move, but if executed right it would give her leverage to pull out of the hold on her. It had worked in self-defense class, anyway.

Sure enough, the man holding her moved his arms to get a better grasp on her limp body. Using the leverage of his movement, she planted her foot more firmly and proceeded to slip out of the man's grasp. She hit the ground, pulling him with her, then she rolled, stood up and began to run in the direction she had seen Patrick taken. She was only a few feet away when she heard a shot ring out.

It was close by, her hearing was buzzing now, but she felt the person who had been holding her and chasing her fall to the ground. She tried to veer right and make it around and underneath a two-tiered section of the docks, but hands reached out a grabbed her again. She screamed, but it was cut off by a hand covering her mouth. This time her pursuer had another weapon at his disposal in addition to brute strength – chemical persuasion. She felt the sting of the chemical in her nose before she could actually smell it and feel the burn in her lungs. She tried to slow her breathing, but the hand tightened and instinct kicked in and she couldn't stop herself from taking a deep breath.

Everything went black.

* * *

"It's all right, you can let him go."

The arms that had been banded around Patrick's body released and he stumbled forward, gasping, into the small area of light in between the piles of wooden crates in the pier warehouse. "What the hell? Where's Robin?" He turned back towards the men who had been holding him, but they had stepped back into the darkness. He turned back towards where he had heard the familiar Australian voice come from.

"Sorry for the rough treatment, Dr. Drake. We had to get you out of the way as soon as possible. Where's my daughter?"

One of the men stepped back into the light. "We're sorry, sir. They got your daughter. They took our men out. Sykes is following them."

"Who has Robin?" Patrick demanded.

"The same man that probably has your father," Robert said tersely. "Contact me as soon as she's stationary and secure the area. I want to be one site for the retrieval."

"My father? What are you talking about?" Patrick demanded.

"Do you want to do the honors, Luv?" Robert said to someone behind him.

A determined looking Anna came striding out of the darkness, a gun in her hand.

* * *

"Robin? Are you all right?"

Every syllable of the voice's words throbbed in her head. Robin groaned and opened her eyes, only to quickly scrunch them closed again.

"Robin." The person moved to cover her and block some the harsh light from her face. "Open your eyes slowly. Let me take a look."

"Noah?" Robin said in wonder and followed his instructions. She blinked a few times until the older doctor came into focus. "Where are we? Where's Patrick?" Suddenly remembering what had happened she sat up from her prone position on the concrete floor, swaying dizzily at the movement.

"Slow down. You were drugged." Noah held her stead. "What do you mean, Patrick?"

"We were together when we were grabbed." She turned her head and looked around a the furnished office they were in. "They didn't put him in here? Where are we?"

"Not too creatively, we're at Pier 9, which means your parents should find us soon and that's probably the plan."

"My parents?" Robin narrowed her eyes. "You're not drunk."

Noah smirked for a moment. "Haven't been in a hundred and ninety-nine days. We're in one of Jason Morgan's warehouses. It's being used by Lorenzo Alcazar to smuggle arms. Whoa, you sure you're ready to get up?" Noah asked as he helped Robin steady and then stand up.

"You're working with my parents?"

"Your father. Your mother wasn't too pleased when she found out."

"I can't believe they knew and let Patrick think…I can't believe you let Patrick think that you went back to drinking. Do you have any idea how hurt he is?"

"I had my reasons."

Robin sighed and looked around the room and was pleased to discover the pounding in her head was receding. "Why didn't they put Patrick in here…" Robin broke off and frowned.

"What happened?" Noah asked worriedly.

"I don't think he was taken by Alcazar's men, if that's who have us? We were both grabbed and then whoever had me was shot, I think, and I was taken again. I was drugged." She felt the remnants of the burn in her throat.

"Your parents might have gotten to him before Alcazar."

"What does he want with us?" she asked, hoping Patrick was all right.

"Me, he's probably pissed off that I was messing in his business and he might be keeping me alive to get to Anna. You, probably to get to Robert and find out where he's hidden Alcazar's pregnant girlfriend."

"Why would he use you to get to my mother?" Robin asked, then suspicion began to dawn on her.

Noah flushed and slid his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. "This is not exactly how we envisioned telling you."

"Noah, are you involved with my mother?" Robin asked in surprise.

Noah nodded and licked his lips, waiting for Robin's reaction.

"Wow." Robin looked around. "I suppose the door is locked?" There were no windows.

"That's it? Wow?"

"We'll have plenty of time for reactions later, I hope," Robin said as she studied the door lock. Unfortunately, it wasn't pickable from inside. Robin turned around, her hands on her hips, her eyes searching for anything they could use for weapons.


	29. Chapter 29

**Twenty-Nine**

"We'll send someone to the hospital with you, unless you prefer to wait in your hotel room?" Robert Scorpio thought he was being generous giving the doctor the option on where to wait.

"What I would prefer is to know what you're going to do to get my father and Robin back." Patrick stood with his hands on his hips, his face a big mass of stubborn.

"Just leave that to the professionals young man," Robert said dismissively before turning to wave over one of his men.

Patrick stepped towards Robert. "I'm getting a little tired of being manhandled and I'm not going into hiding and waiting while you figure out how to get to my father and Robin."

"Son, we're just trying to protect you. I respect that you keep your head in a crisis, but this is not the sort of …"

"Robert, let's not waste the time arguing. If Patrick wants to help then let him." She turned to face Patrick, her tone and her expression completely serious. "You understand that this is dangerous and we can't guarantee your safety."

"I'm aware of that and I'm also aware that one or both of them might need medical attention and it'll be good to have me on site." His stomach twisted with the reality of the argument, but he didn't let it show on his face. Anna saw it anyway and her expression softened perceptibly.

"Fine, he's with you." Robert threw up his hands in surrender and stalked off.

Patrick watched him go. "He doesn't seem to like me much," he observed.

"Robert takes his father's prerogative to hate his daughter's boyfriend seriously since he's trying to make up for lost time. Believe me, if he really hated you a lot of things would start to go wrong in your life."

Patrick grimaced at Anna's attempt at levity. "So what I can do?"

* * *

"We could staple them into submission?" Robin commented as she looked over the pile of virtually useless office supplies they had gathered up on top of the desk.

"You'd think a mafia office would have hidden weapons of something." Noah's voice was slightly muffled from where he was feeling around under the couch. Finding nothing but things he'd rather not identify, he sat up and wiped his palms on his pants and looked at Robin. "I guess we're stuck with the letter opener of death."

Robin laughed at his quip and then sobered up and blew out a breath. "We need to figure out how to get out of here."

"I've searched the room a dozen times and so have you. You might fit out that window." Noah pointed to the small window well above both their heads. "But the entire crew is still working out there on the ship."

"I wouldn't leave you alone in here anyway." Robin stood with her hands on her hips and stared at the window, her face still tight as she tried to think of a solution. If her mother was here she'd know how to get out of there. The thought prodded her thinking. "Then it's obvious that the only way out is by overpowering whoever comes in here."

"They aren't taking pains to hide us far from where either of us were taken. Chances are your parents know where we are. And as emasculating as it might sound, fighting off men with guns doesn't sound too appealing." Noah held his hands out self-deprecatingly. "Maybe we could find a way to get them a message?"

Robin sighed and leaned back against the desk. Noah was right, the only thing to do was wait. "I knew my mother was really here for work." She sighed.

"Hey." Noah put his hand on Robin's shoulder. "You know how much your mother loves you. She wanted to be here with you."

"I know." Robin looked at Noah and shrugged. "I'm used to things not being what they seem with my parents and I'll get over it, but Patrick isn't used to that, Noah."

Noah put his hands on his hips and looked away for a moment. "I went into this accepting the fact that Patrick might not forgive me one more time; but if it kept him and you and Anna alive I decided it was worth it."

"Noah." Robin put her hand on Noah's arm. Before she could complete her thought the door opened behind her. Noah stepped in front of Robin to face the visitors.

* * *

"Does it mean something?" Patrick asked stiffly. They were standing on the other side of the building on Pier 9 where it had been confirmed by Sykes that Robin and Noah were being held. Patrick had been relieved that they hadn't been taken far, but Robert's face had been red with fury at the news.

"It means it's a message to us," Anna explained when Robert just narrowed his eyes and took the safety off his gun.

Oh. Patrick wiped his palms on his thighs. "Does that mean they're going to let them go?" he asked in a choked voice.

"What now?" he asked when he got out of his head long enough to watch Anna and Robert directing the team of men who were with them.

"We get them." A pair of binoculars were slapped into Patrick's hand. "You keep a look out and talk into this when you see something." Robert then handed him an ear piece. "Think you can handle it, Dr. Drake?" Robert asked.

"Where do I stand?" Patrick put the ear piece on and looked Robert in the eyes.


	30. Chapter 30

**Thirty**

PANT.

STOMP.

PANT.

STOMP.

Something was about to go wrong. He could see it through the useless binocular duty they had distracted him with. The binoculars were long gone somewhere into the Port Charles River as he raced towards the entrance to the warehouse. Panting and sweating he rammed through the thugs blocking the open warehouse doors. In his haste he tripped over one of the burly guys he had knocked to the floor, regained his balance and kept running towards the center of the warehouse where they were having a stand off he had been watching from afar. He didn't notice one of the thugs stand up and get taken out by a shot cracking out behind him. He wouldn't have cared if he had. He had to get to them. To her. To him.

All he could hear was the pounding of his feet and his heart. He skidded around a corner of cartons and slid to a stop. "No!" he cried out.

* * *

"It's me you want, let them go." Robert Scorpio held up his hands and gave his trademark charming smile and looking as cool and relaxed as if he was on a beach vacation and not standing with his ex-wife, a crew of agents and his daughter and Noah Drake being held at gun point in front of him.

"I'm thinking I'm going to get what I want and you," Lorenzo Alcazar said, himself looking cool and collected in his well-tailored black suit as his goons held the power. "I guess your ex-wife is not only losing her touch, but you're losing her."

Anna narrowed her eyes as Alcazar and kept a firm grip on the gun she had trained on the man.

"Where's my child, Scorpio?" Alcazar demanded.

"Last I heard Diego was off romancing the daughter of a deep cover WSB agent. Perhaps he would have been safer in prison?" Robert said in a matter-of-fact voice.

"You don't say?" Alcazar motioned towards one of his men and had Noah Drake brought closer to him. "Dr. Drake, I hear that dating an agent is dangerous business. I guess you can confirm that, no?" His eyes went cold and he looked at Anna. "Deadly in fact, if I don't get what I want. Let my ship go and tell me where my baby is."

"We already know what you want. Now, how about I tell you what I want? You let my daughter and Dr. Drake go and you surrender. All nice and peaceful like."

"I can see how you two were attracted to each other. The couple that is delusional together stays together. Oh, but you didn't, did you? In a bit of staggering irony, Ms. Devane here hid a baby from you didn't she?" Alcazar made another motion and the goon holding Robin pushed her forward towards Alcazar, keeping the gun trained on her back. Alcazar grabbed her by hair and pulled, exposing her neck. He rested his long fingers on the white skin. "Children are precious, aren't they? It's painful when someone even threatens to keep them from you, isn't it?" His eyes darted between Anna and Robert, taking in the dangerous gleam in Robert's eyes and the cold calculation with which Anna kept hold of her gun.

"Let the innocents go and let's deal with each other directly, Alcazar."

"Tempting, but no," Alcazar told Robert and tightened his grasp on Robin's neck. She choked slightly, but made no move to escape.

A gun clicked, a shot ran out.

* * *

Patrick lunged forward but wasn't in time to stop the bodies smashing down to the ground. He heard a crunch and then a thud. His doctor instincts kicked in and he knelt down to lend aid, either secure in the certainty that Anna and Robert would take care of the chaos around them or uncaring as he ran his hands over and through the tangle of Robin and Noah's bodies.

Noah had gotten the signal from Anna and dived for Robin, knocking her out of Alcazar's hands. Shots had rung out and now Noah and Robin lay unmoving on the ground, Noah on top of Robin.

"Robin? Dad?" he called out. A groan answered him. "Robin?"

"Noah hit his head on the ground," Robin gasped, panted.

Patrick touched his father's face and turned it slightly and in doing so he saw the bruise forming on his father's temple. His father's respiration was steady and his pulse was similarly okay. He eased Noah onto the ground and off Robin. She was lying on her side and didn't move when he eased his father's weight off him. Her face was pale and her breathing labored.

"Rib, no puncture," Robin gasped out, holding herself immobile best she could.

"We need an ambulance here!" Patrick called out, his eyes darting from his unconscious father to his girlfriend who could puncture a lung with one wrong move.

"On the way." Anna knelt down and ran her hand over Noah's body. "How is he?"

Patrick dug into his pockets and pulled out a pen light. He moved around Robin and studied his father's pupils. His lips tightened into a thin line.

"Tell me," Robin croaked out.

"Stop talking, Scorpio," Patrick moved back to Robin and carefully helped her straighten her body. Sirens began to sound in the distance.

"Tell me."

"Unequal, slow reaction to light."

She knew that it meant a potentially serious injury. "I'm sorry," she grasped his hand. He squeezed it back, torn between gratitude that she was okay and worry for his father.

"Where's that ambulance?" Patrick called out and then looked around. Lorenzo Alcazar was down on the ground with a gunshot wound square in the middle of his head. He didn't feel the slightest bit tempted to check the criminal's status.

* * *

"Keep this on until I tell you otherwise and you're on bed rest for the next few days," Dr. Alan Quatermaine ordered Dr. Robin Scorpio as the nurse put an immobilizer on her arm and around her torso. Her rib had indeed been shown to have been snapped clean through and another couple of bruised, fortunately they had been able to wrap it all without surgery. Both doctors knew that any further movement or pressure and surgery could be required to set it. "Otherwise I'm admitting you with a full body cast."

"Yes, sir." Robin smiled at her boss and old friend and caregiver. "How's Noah?"

"Patrick went with him for a CAT Scan. They should be back soon."

"I need to go to them."

Alan tightened his lips. "In a wheelchair. That's my final offer."

* * *

"How is he?" Robin asked quietly, startling Patrick from his close study of the films from Noah's scan.

Patrick turned around and looked at Robin, licking his lips. "How are you?" He walked over and put his hand on his head.

"Tied to this thing." She reached up with her free hand and took Patrick's. "How's Noah?"

"A herniation is growing."

"Dr. Dumont could operate."

Patrick smiled ruefully and knelt down next to Robin's wheelchair. "With the medication he's on after the transplant, he might not make it through the surgery. And he might not appreciate another surgery without his consent."

"Is he going to wake up? Has he?"

"Briefly. He'll be in and out." Patrick stroked her cheek. "He's a good candidate for your protocol. I was thinking that we could start tonight, unless you need to rest? You should probably get some rest first."

Robin's stomach tightened and she looked away. "I don't think the drug treatment good option. You can administer coagulants during the surgery to counteract the transplant meds." She nervously pulled her hand out of Patrick's.

Patrick frowned.

"Patrick, I don't want you to be angry, but you should know that Noah, your father, all this time he wasn't really drinking, he was spying for my mother," Robin said hurriedly before he could ask anything.

"I know. Robin…"

"And there's more. My mom and your dad, they're involved."

"If I didn't know that before Anna's hovering in the warehouse would have clued me in." Patrick smirked. "Robin…"

"We could end up siblings, which in the grand scheme of weirdness in this town would hardly be noticed. Listen, you should get back to caring for your dad. Do you think I could see him?" Robin avoided his eyes during her hurried monologue.

"Robin!" Patrick put his hand on her chin and tilted it to look at him. "How are you? What's going on in there?" He touched her head gently.

Tears filled Robin's eyes and she bit her lip. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."


	31. Chapter 31

**Thirty-One**

"Mmmmm."

"Noah?" Anna Devane got up from the bedside chair and bent down over Noah Drake's prone figure. "Noah, can you hear me?" she whispered.

"Mmmm, Anna?" he croaked out as he blinked his eyes to try and focus.

"Keep your eyes closed, darling." Anna ghosted her fingers over his forehead and eyelids. "Doctor's orders."

"I'm the doctor, not you," he joked weakly.

"Not today. Today you're just a plain old hero. Albeit a bit battered and bruised." Anna clasped his hand.

"A hero, eh? How's Robin?" Noah suddenly remembered what had happened and tried to open his eyes. Anna covered them with her hand.

"She's fine. Thanks to you. Patrick is fine as well, although he'd like to kill all of us for getting you here like this."

"What is like this?" Noah was silent for a moment. "I've never felt this inside my own head before, but I've probably seen it a thousand times in a scan." His words were getting weaker, his respirations more shallow despite the oxygen feed in his nose. "Surgery?"

"Maybe. Or maybe one of my brilliant daughter's concoctions." She brushed his unruly hair gently.

"Patrick will love that." His breathing got more labored.

"Go back to sleep. It's my turn to take care of you," Anna whispered as Noah slipped back into unconsciousness. She sighed softly and pressed a kiss to his cheek.

* * *

Tears filled Robin's eyes and she bit her lip. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." She blinked to try to stem her tears and one slid free down her cheek.

"What are you sorry for?" Patrick slid his fingers up Robin's cheek and knuckled at the flowing tear.

"For being a coward." With her free hand she took the hand she had pulled out of moments before. "When you mentioned using one of my treatments I got scared and I let the fear get in the way." She schooled her features and raised her chin, looking Patrick in the eyes. "What happened to Jeremy will not happen to Noah. I promise you that."

"Robin, it's not…"

"Will you take me to the lab?" Robin interrupted him.

Patrick hesitated for a moment before standing up and getting behind her wheelchair. Despite himself his lips curved into an admiring smile.

* * *

"I hear we have a rogue patient in here. Dr. Quatermaine is threatening to put you under restraints," Nurse Epiphany Johnson announced as she walked into Robin's lab where Patrick was acting as Robin's hands and preparing the drug combination and the treatment syringes.

"After we're done with this I'll help him," Patrick said, his attention not wavering from his task.

"Hey!" Robin protested and glared at a smiling Patrick. She sighed when he didn't look one iota of chagrined. "One more syringe and the rest go into Freezer C in a sealed bottle."

Patrick did as directed. While his back turned, Robin sagged in her wheelchair and closed her eyes in her pale face. Epiphany didn't miss it. "Dr. Drake, why don't you go do doctor things and I'll help Dr. Scorpio here finish up."

Patrick turned and looked at Robin who had rallied before he looked at her, causing Epiphany's lips to thin ominously.

"Go ahead. I'll be down to start the treatment once we hit the five hour mark," Robin said.

"Go, scoot, scoot." Epiphany walked over and herded Patrick out of the lab, giving him just enough space to wave at Robin before the door closed on him. Epiphany turned and gave Robin the eye. "All right, missy, it's time for you to take care of yourself." She put her hands on her hips to show she meant business. Robin's protest died on her lips at the look.

* * *

"How's he doing?" Anna looked up at Patrick who was studying Noah's chart as he walked into the hospital room.

"Stable. We're going to start the drug treatment within the hour." Patrick put the chart into the slot at the end of the bed and walked to his father's head. Noah now had an oxygen mask to help stabilize his oxygen intake. Patrick's face tightened as he looked at his father, then he shook it off and took a pen light out of his white lab coat. He bent down and studied his father's pupils.

"Should you be treating him, Patrick? I mean being so close to the case?"

"Dr. Dumont is his primary doctor and Robin is the consulting. I'm just playing back up."

"How's my daughter doing?" Anna stood up.

At the mention of Robin Patrick smiled. "She's stubborn, brave, pretending she's not in as much pain as she is. Normal, Robin. But I called in reinforcements."

"Good. Take care of her, Patrick. And Noah." Anna looked over at the man she had fallen in love with. She touched his hand briefly, Patrick's eyes following the move. "I'll let you spend some time alone with him and go back up those reinforcements."

Patrick watched her go before sitting down on the chair next to the bed that she had vacated. "Well, Dad. You've made it really difficult to be pissed off at you for faking your descent back into the bottle. Saving the life of my girlfriend and doing it for love and all." Patrick paused and licked his lip. "I wish you had told me what you were up to. There seems to be a lot of half truths around me lately and maybe later I'll wonder what that means, but for right now I'll just say I'm really proud of you. That doesn't mean your work is done, though. There's a bunch of people waiting for you to get well and Robin is battling some serious insecurity right now about her drug treatments so you can't let her down. That gorgeous woman you have waiting for you should be enough motivation." Patrick leaned in closer to his father's ear. "I love you, Dad." Patrick put his hand over Noah's, where Anna had moments before.


	32. Chapter 32

_A/N: Thanks so much for reading and for the lovely feedback!_

**Thirty-Two**

"How was it?" Dr. Kelly Lee asked the moment her roommate walked into their loft apartment. She was sitting in one of their very cushy and trendy navy blue chairs, her bare legs stretched out and resting on a matching ottoman. She had shucked her constricting party clothes and was lounging in pink boxers and a matching cami-tank, her long, silky hair in a pony tail.

Robin groaned and toed off her high-heeled slides. "I just want to take a shower and go to sleep." Today was a hectic day at the hospital. She had had her follow-up exam on Noah who was recovering wonderfully from his heroics, had the last of her course of ever-decreasing bandages removed from her ribs, finished some last minute changes to a journal articles, fielded calls and telegrams resulting from an award she had just won from the European Neurology Association and most recently mediated a battle between her parents.

"That good or that bad?" Dr. Lainey Winters asked, coming out of the kitchen with a couple of bottles of water in her hand. She was similarly already dressed for bed in white shorts and a tank top.

"Great, except for having to disarm my parents."

"Robert still pissed about Senior Hottie Drake and Anna?" Kelly asked.

"Hey, hey, he's not jealous about that, he's just concerned about…ah hell." Lainey flopped down onto the couch and tossed Robin a bottle of water.

Robin caught the bottle and grimaced at her roommate. Since the night Robert had dinner at the loft he and Lainey had been having a flirtation. "Sorry, I'm sure it's mainly habit." Robin took a sip of her water. "But then you're the psychiatrist. Maybe you can medicate him?"

"I think I'm the one who needs the medication. But damn, Robert is so sexy."

"Okay, too much information. It's bad enough I have to hear dish about Noah from my mother."

"Ooooh! What does she say about Hottie Senior?" Kelly leaned forward, practically drooling.

Robin blushed and dropped her head. "Okay, he's hot, but he's also Patrick's father. I can't go there!" Robin shook her head.

"Speaking of going there, Junior Hottie is on his way over. He called a few minutes ago, said he couldn't reach you on your cell but the hospital told him you had left," Kelly told her. "So you'd best go put on your sexies!"

"In your professional opinion, why do I stay living with you guys?" Robin turned her head and asked Lainey.

"Because imagine the conversation right now if you were still living alone? Boring!" Lainey laughed.

"There's that. I'm going to go shower. Let Patrick in if I'm not done?" Robin stood up and headed towards her room.

"Oh, most definitely," Kelly said. "You sure you can't give me one detail?" she called out as Robin walked into her room. Robin's groan was cut off by the closing of her door. "She loves us," Kelly said to Lainey with an evil grin.

* * *

"Hey sexy."

"Hey yourself. Why didn't you join me?" Robin walked out of the bathroom wearing her yellow robe to find Patrick lying under the sheet on her bed.

"Decided to enjoy the view without getting all messy."

"Yes, because you're so fastidious." Robin rubbed her hair with a white towel and then grabbed a comb and began to comb it watching Patrick through his reflection in the mirror. "What gives?"

"I'm afraid of showers now."

"Don't tell me." Robin turned around and leaned back against the dresser. "Icky parent disclosure?"

Patrick covered his eyes. "I'm scarred for life. But it gets better." He took his hand down and looked at her questioningly.

"What?" Robin asked, shaking her head.

"They're moving in together."

"What! That must be what the battle I walked in on tonight between my parents was about." Robin blew out a breath. "That's quick."

"They're old, they don't have much time." His implication was clear – they did.

"That's mean!" Robin put her hands on her hips and glared at him, her eyes twinkling in amusement at his sense of panic.

"No, what's mean is you standing there wet and naked instead of getting into bed with me." Patrick flipped back some of the sheet and pat the bed next to him.

Robin contemplated teasing him for a moment, but decided she didn't want to punish herself too. "I got my bandages off today." She untied her robe.

"I know it was a big day for you, award winner."

She let the robe drop to the floor and walked towards the bed, running her hands over her rib cage. "I'm free." She bit her lip and climbed onto the bed.

"And damn sexy." Patrick put his arm around her waist and pulled her on top of him. He ran his hands over her torso making her shiver. "Nice. Bare skin." He flipped them over until he was on top of her and leaned in and initiated a heated kiss. When she was sufficiently melted underneath him he pulled back. "Do I get to go to Europe with you when you get your award?"

"You'll definitely get a mention in my acceptance speech." She sighed and pulled his head back down to hers.

* * *

Her fingers dug into the bare skin of his back as she arched into him, pulling him deeper inside of her, filling her. She felt his body begin to shake and her own pulsed ahead of him.

"I love you," he whispered into her ear and his quick thrusts slowed and lengthened. His groan filled the room as he filled the condom that sheathed him inside her and she pulsed around him. Her entire body tingled and light flashed before her closed eyes as his weight pressed her into the bed, grounding her.

"I love you," she whispered back when she could speak.

"That's was so good." His voice was a sexy purr that curled her toes. "I think we should do it again."

"Definitely," she said, meaning it. Then she wrapped her leg around his and flipped them over so that she was on top. "Switch. This time I lead."

**END**


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